Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Before everything became a mess, Chaivat was not used to having prejudices: coming across a foreigner, a fellow countryman, a man, a woman, a homosexual, had never been a problem to him.

Before that day.

Before all of that.

And what followed from it.

Chaivat hates pale faces; he hates the way light seems to reflect on their cheekbones like water-soaked pearls, the softness that that skin, that nose, those lips seem to have, the way each stroke is defined and symmetrical. The illusion that whoever possesses this characteristic is pure and innocent.

Chaivat knows that’s not the truth.

And it’s the same truth that’s hard to find first, and then to endure: the truth in the eyes of his son, in the eye of police officers, neighbors, journalists, while they huddle around the house like vultures. The truth in that man’s eyes, when the judge declares the trial closed and sends everyone home. 

Everybody but him.

A truth that weighs for days, months, years, weighs on the balance of his life, on the choices he makes, on days and nights, weighs on his sleep and his wake, weighs on his wife and, oh gosh, Type. At some point, Chaivat stops looking people in the eye, stops perceiving their doubt, their ignorance, their pity, their reproach.

(But is there really this reproach? Is it really his fault? Every time he asks Type, between tears and excuses, his son always says no. But it’s hard to live with the guilt.)

But he can’t close his eyes for long, he can’t afford it. Not when his sleep is punctuated by shouts, moans, and requests for help, and the day gets confused with the night; he then becomes a robot, a car without automatic gearbox, and suddenly sends home everyone, waiters, housekeepers, guests (and they get angry, God if they get angry, but he doesn’t care, his life is hanging by a thread, his marriage as well, he has no time to discuss with some European tourists uptight).

And when everyone’s gone, something explodes, and the desire to destroy the dream of a life, the work of a life, that resort so hard-earned and wanted, where he spent the best years of his life, makes him crazy. 

His wife finds him, among broken glass, rubble, and fallen chairs, with bloody hands for the punches given to the wall, on his knees as if to apologize, the name of his son pronounced as a litany.

He doesn’t want that place, he doesn’t want the place where everything happened, with that basement, that chair, those ropes, that ball, those little bloodstains on the dusty earth.

(After the police had left, declaring every evidence hired and reassuring them that they could reopen the resort, he and his wife had been closed there two days: one to cry, held in an embrace full of remorse, to wonder the why and the how of all; and one to try to clean up that blood. And as much as they tried, not even the strongest alcohol or ammonia was able to erase the halo.)

And for the first time, a week after the fact, he begins to feel something different, beyond remorse, sadness, and worry: for the first time he feels hate, warm, dense, a powerful and unknown sensation, a strong, impetuous motion, a thing never heard. He, who only had a grudge against football teams and inept coaches, against some clever supplier or some rude customer. 

Chaivat is a broken man, no, he’s a broken father.

And of the life full of certainties he possessed, not even the echo remained.

But hate gives him strength.

The strength to look his son in the eye again, to sit with him and listen to small excerpts of the story, to embrace him when everything is too much, when he starts to tremble and wheeze, and there is no more air, no more oxygen, for both of them. And it is this same force that keeps him up at night, standing with his wife outside a white door, the inscription “Type's Room" in green italics that stares at them continuously, when his son refuses to share his pain, physical and emotional, his shame, his fear. They hear him crying and screaming for hours, or worse, not making any breath, at most a few hiccups, and they can’t get in, because the door is closed and Type doesn’t want them, he doesn’t want anyone, he doesn’t want his friends, his ball, his spicy rice, his coke. And the biggest terror is that he doesn’t even want his life either.

Hate begins to penetrate every day and learns new words: "faggot", "fag", "joke of nature", "error". He learns new ways to vent, new people to pour his guilt, innocent culprits of something that could not be predicted and that he could not avoid

(To this conclusion he will come only many years later, watching Type melt into the arms of another man, promising him to love and respect him forever, until death do them part)

He brings his hatred with him everywhere: in the police station, in the court, in prison, when he goes to visit that man, asking the reason for his actions and receiving an amused giggle back. Hate holds his family together, holds his nerves and his forces together, and doesn’t bring him down at Type’s refusals to come out of his room, to play, to talk, to eat; hate makes him his wife’s rock, as she is more broken than him, so fierce in defending the innocence of his son, and so fragile in collapsing before the umpteenth door slammed in the face. 

Hate gives him the strength to scream: in the market, on the beach, to the journalists, in court, on the phone with the lawyer, against all the evil tongues and uncomfortable questions, against unwanted photos and letters. Because they didn’t make it all up, his son isn’t lying: Type was violated, assaulted by a man who he thought was his friend, a 56-year-old man, a pale face, whom his father trusted and who had never given any unclear signs. No Type is not willing to give interviews, nor are they; no Type will not speak in court, will not testify directly, will not be subjected to public judgment, an effort that his son doesn't want and can’t make. No, they will not forgive, they will not forgive that man, nor his family, even if in the end he meets Buddha, Jesus Christ, or Allah himself. That disgusting, ugly, and horrible faggot.

(He doesn’t even imagine that he will apologize for this word, standing at sixty years in front of a farang of twenty-seven, after so many screams and so many, so many tears)

Chaivat frees himself.

And slowly, slowly, a glimmer of normality returns.

Type leaves his room almost two months after the fact, at closed trial, with the knowledge that the man who injured him can no longer hurt him. Type is still 11 years old, but it’s like he’s 30, the tales of bees and flowers now useless, as well as bedtime stories. Type doesn’t play yet, he spends his days with Khom, sitting on the shore, his feet wet by the sea, and keeps silent. Type doesn’t laugh yet, at most he raises the corner of the mouth if he sees a shell or if what his friend says is quite funny. 

Type sits at the kitchen table and tries to put himself on the line with the school, but his head is elsewhere and he can’t understand divisions. Type then nods when his father tells him that he can drop out of school this year, he’ll think about it the year after (Type doesn’t say it, but he’s afraid to go back to school, where everyone knows about him and what he’s become).

When Type returns to manifest his emotions, Chaivat is the only one who truly understands him. Type is unrecognizable: he still manages to be like before, but he is not like before, and in his happiness, in his anger, in his sadness, in his boredom, there is always something that doesn’t add up, something that only Chaivat can perceive because it is the same empty acid that animates his days.

Because that tear in your son’s life is now filled with rage, just as it was with him.

He looks into Type’s eyes, sees himself, and gets scared. But he doesn’t say anything.

And Type? He does what he does best, he survives. He is angry and beats any of his friends trying to talk to him, he also beats Khom, but the boy is stubborn and keeps coming back every day, standing up, in front of his best friend, without ever losing hope. He is angry and escapes at every touch, caress or hug, even those of his mother. He is so angry that even in his nightmares he continues to fight, the echo of the ropes on his wrists still vivid, while in the dream he tries to get rid and kick in the balls that asshole, that damn faggot, that damn pale face.

(Although in reality he is still afraid, and in tears, he keeps calling: "Dad!

Mom!

Dad!

Mom!

...Tharn!")

But he gets even angrier when he meets the looks of pity and worry that await him on the first day of school, he who does not want a different treatment or fake regret, he who would just like to be normal. So, he does what he does best, he survives, and then gets angry and punches everybody.

When they call Chaivat from the school, he already knows what is waiting for him, he already knows what must be done, he already knows what the only solution is.

And so, the only thing he feels when he accompanies his twelve-year-old son to the airport, holding a ticket to Bangkok and the promise of a different life far from where everyone knows, but also far from his parents, the only thing he feels is hatred.

Oh, he hates pale faces.

Chapter Text

Chaivat continues to hate pale faces; he hates the fake kindness and the fake candor that they seem to convey, the friendliness that they let glimpse, and the security that they convey. He hates that their eyes are so seemingly sincere, so pure, so joyful.

His son’s eyes aren’t anymore.

Not that the situation has worsened since, twelve years old and no hopes, he has accompanied him to a new life, in a larger and frenetic city, full of people too busy with their lives to pay attention to this wounded and lost boy. His son somehow survived. He got up, rolled up his sleeves, and built a life from scratch: a new character, a new way of doing things, a new approach to the world.
Chaivat knows that Type has friends, sometimes some girlfriends, he’s back to playing football and he’s very good at school; Chaivat knows, but he doesn’t really know. And how could he? His son did not grow up with him, with his mother, in his land, with his childhood friends; he grew up far from home, relying for advice and affection on relatives who, when sweet and available, are not his parents.

(And it’s all his fault)

In the beginning, he couldn’t see his son for a year: too much fear, too many memories, too many clients and meddlers, curious to know his story, the story of a poor, small, innocent child violated by a shitty, revolting and evil faggot. He wonders if they were even curious to know his machete... or those little spiders left under the pillowcases (What do you want? We are in a resort in the middle of nature! It is normal that they infiltrate, we can’t control the animals!). 

Bastards.
You bastards.

He and his wife lived for years on autopilot: alarm clock, resort, call to Type, resort, call from Type, dinner, bed, and back again, again and again.
Then, one fine summer day, he heard himself called, "Dad, Dad, where are you?”, he turned, and his son, the same little dark-haired boy he had not been able to embrace for a year and who even before shunned his every touch as if he were sunburned, jumped in his arms, with joy and contentment that he did not expect to see. His son was healed, and everything was back to normal. Everything would be back to normal.

(Please, I beg you)

They had been talking all day about school, about friends, about a certain Team (a bit stupid, according to Type, but quite funny and with a large collection of video games) and teachers that he liked better; they laughed at his gaffes and jokes, they complimented his mother for the great food, they walked hand in hand on the beach, and Chaivat, Buddha, didn’t think he’d ever been so happy. And in his head he began to form the prospect of a new life, a life in which his son could grow up with him, in his childhood home, maybe get passionate about the hotel career and think about continuing the resort, when they would retire: now that Type is healed, that he has defeated the monster, there is no longer any reason to keep him out of his home, his parents and his strength would be enough to protect him.

And then the night came.

(Type didn’t need to heal, now he knows, he just needed to feel safe again, protected, out of that comfort-zone that his parents and himself had created. He needed someone to love him unreservedly, the man he was and the man he had become. Someone who loved him despite his anger, and who didn’t stop at that facade of greed that he has let the world see.)

At first, he did not wake up: that feeling seemed to him too strange, too anomalous, an echo of a past that no longer belonged to him, like a barely vivid dream, where you are conscious of dreaming and so you’re waiting for your brain to build some scenario, and you wait, wait for your psyche to take you somewhere. 
It was his wife who woke him up, shaking him slightly, she also confused by those noises suffused: they both woke up, sitting against the headboard of the bed, still half asleep, trying to understand where those whimpering came from. It was a moment, a second, an instant shock, a burning realization, and he felt himself dying. He ran out of bed to his son’s room, knowing what he would find, and opened the door.

It hasn’t changed a fuck, it hasn't changed a fuck at all, and he was an idiot to think it would take a year away from the island to get better, and he was even more of an idiot to think about bringing Type back, and forcing him to that memory spiral, just so he could have him around like he used to, when soccer balls were just soccer balls and ropes were for jumping.
It was like he went back in time, with Type muffling the screams and nightmares in his pillow so he wouldn’t be heard, while the monster chased him around every corner of his head and forced him to satisfy him, and they, his damn parents, couldn’t get close, they could not even touch him, and they watched helplessly as their child crumbled.

( I tell you he doesn’t! Here in Bangkok, he doesn’t! At first maybe, the first few months, but it’s been weeks since Type had a nightmare!

How do you know? How do you know that at night he cries in silence or screams in the pillow to not be heard?

This house has tissue paper walls, you can hear every little noise. And then? Who did you get me for? I check on him at night, sneak into his room to see if he’s really asleep. I raised you and your cousins, Chaivat, I know if you pretend to sleep, and Type sleeps. He doesn’t dream much, sometimes he gets agitated, but in recent times he has never cried.

And why is he doing it now? He’s at home, with his parents, in his bed! Why now? What have we done?) 

(What have I done? )

Type cries all night, and the next day, apologizing in sobs, promising that he will try to sleep well and not wake them up, and he and his wife’s heart breaks, because a 13-year-old should not have these responsibilities, these worries, these regrets, and they, his parents, should be able to make him understand that.
Type cries all day, and the same night, he starts to get angry, oh god, if he gets angry; first with himself, because he is a stupid child who is not able to set himself up and be brave and face the nightmares. Then, he gets angry with the gays, nay, with the faggots: they, who are revolting creatures, without restraint, against nature, who convert the straight, the "normal", to be like them, filthy rapists and profiteers. 
Words too strong and too heavy for a child of his age, who should still be immune to hatred, words that his father does not correct, indeed incites: in his mind, if Type will do as he, if he will find someone to blame, instead of himself, eventually it will heal and reopen to the world.

( Ironic, Dad? Isn’t it? It took a filthy gay man to make him happy, aren’t you happy?

Shut up, Tharn, and pass me the hot sauce, I’ll teach you how to eat!

No, no, I beg pardon no! Everything except the sauce! )

They take him back to Bangkok. They cannot do otherwise, Type deserves to live his adolescence in the most normal way possible, even if this means doing it away from his parents, away from his father.

The years go by. Type has a girlfriend, Yinwa, but it’s not serious, she’s too clingy and too possessive, she’s only good for sex, and to show her around, they fight a lot and her son eventually leaves her. He also has a new best friend, Techno, who gets on his nerves too many times and is overly naive, but despite everything, he loves him, even if he never admits it.
He decides to enroll in sports medicine, and this destroys Chaivat for a moment: not that he doesn’t want his son to build his own life, but he always hoped that sooner or later he would come home, and he would run the resort with him.
He plays soccer, and balls don’t scare him that much anymore.
He is an impulsive and stubborn boy.
He hates gay people.
These are the things he knows about his son, and really, they’re good enough.

He returns home only in summer and holidays from school; at first, it is difficult, and his mother watches him all night, waiting for him to wake up looking for some comfort. As he grows, however, he begins to avoid those gestures of affection, and the screams calm down; he shakes in his sleep, he sleeps badly, sometimes he wakes up and goes for a walk, but no screams. At least this.
And in his mind, the mind of a father who for nineteen years has coexisted with remorse and guilt, the scene of Type remains vivid, barely thirteen years old, in the arms of his mother, unable to fall asleep, with his pupils cold and wide open, full of fear towards the ceiling.

So don’t blame him if what he feels now, in front of such a scene, is envy, nothing but envy, lacerating and strong, to mess up his brain and night.

Chaivat hates pale faces, hates gays, and fucking hates this goddamn farang named Tharn.

He hates the fact that he is always so sunny and caring, so quiet in his skin, impeccable, affable, captivating. He hates his hair and his eyes, he hates his perfume, the fact that despite all his spite, (Dad? You tried to kill him with a machete!), he did not surrender to him and abandoned his son.
He hates the fact that his son fell in love with a homosexual, that he even lives with him, that they talk about a life together when it was a gay man who ruined him all his life.
He hates the fact that Tharn probably touches him the same way as that monster, that he plagiarized his baby, that Type surrendered to that life perspective because he thinks he doesn’t deserve anything else.
But more than anything, more than any stereotype, more than any belief, more than any prejudice, he hates the fact that he never managed to make his son happy like this.

Type is unrecognizable and has been for a long time, so his father doubly calls himself a fool for not noticing before there is someone in his son’s life: his eyes are shining again, his gestures are more affectionate, his movements more relaxed. He greets his mother with renewed affection, holds her without fear of being tight, and jokes more easily with everyone. After years of running away, Type stopped, and stopped to stay, depending on how he holds his boyfriend’s hand. 

(Oh, I hate to say this shitty word.

Seriously, Dad? We’re married.

Please don’t remind me! )

But Chaivat is not fucking prepared for that.

At nightfall, he had decided to go and check his son’s room, just to make sure that the stranger had not forced him to do something, or worse, that they were sleeping together; his wife follows him, some whispered insult in the night, to blame him for invading their son’s privacy. A son to whom, she adds, he must leave the freedom to make his own choices: he loves a man, so what? As long as he’s a decent person, and Tharn is, that kid is a sweetheart, even for putting up with you, my son can love whoever he wants.

Chaivat is not ready.

He’s not ready for the whirlwind of emotions that follow the sight of that scene.
Tharn and Type are on the bed, with the first one embracing him from behind, practically engulfing him, while holding hands. In their tenderness, they seem so in love, so devoted, but above all, so quiet. 
But that’s not what’s upsetting him.
At a certain point, Type seems to dream something that disturbs him and he begins to move in his sleep; he kicks, twists, and moans something, so Chaivat, like a good caring father, does to go towards him and wake him up, but his wife stops him. 
"Look," she says. 
And Chaivat looks.

Tharn, still asleep, tightens even more Type, rubs his chin over his hair and whispers a simple "Love, quiet, I’m here", just audible; Type stops, like a taut and then relaxed rope, turns in the embrace, and tightens it even stronger.
And come back to smile.

Chaivat hates pale faces, oh how much he hates them.
And he hates Tharn, too, because he’s a pale face and because he’s gay.
Or maybe he envies him.
Because he, in all these years, has never been able to make his son sleep so quiet.

Chapter Text

Chaivat never stops hating pale faces, he cannot do without; not when they seem to sprout from everywhere, from every corner, crevice, cavity, hole. Not when they creep into his sleep, into his nightmares, into his dreams, and he wakes up, in the middle of the night, sweaty and breathless, and runs, runs, up to the beach, feels the water, observes it, and in the reflection, sees nothing but pale faces.

Come to think of it, he has never seen Type with light skin.

It is also logical, he thinks: his son lives (lived) on an island, blessed by a perennial summer, and there is no day (there was) when he and his friends do not stand on the beach, lying in the sun, or chase each other to splash with the warm seawater.

Type has never been pale, always with that veil of tan, even in winter, to make the skin a delicate caramel color, free of defects, scars, redness.

Maybe he should stop talking to the present and start talking to the past.

(Kannika continues to stare at her son’s back, as if she’s trying to memorize it: the curve of the shoulders, the inflection of the chest, the way his son picks up his legs, in a fetal position, as he tries to defend himself.

"Type, honey, take off that shirt... it’s too hot for long sleeves. You risk only to sweat and dehydrate!”

Nothing.

Kannika keeps staring at her son’s back, and for weeks, she can’t afford to do anything else)

Chaivat has never been a nurse, let alone, not even able to put a band-aid; he doesn’t even know if or where they have a first aid kit, or at most bandages, disinfectant, gauze. And yet he becomes one.

Maybe because, at first, it’s the only way to touch his son, to have contact with him, the days after the attack, when Type not only doesn’t speak out but doesn’t dare to leave his bed, not even to go to the bathroom. Type returns home from the hospital three days later, and his skin is no longer perfect: doctors say he is lucky, that the injuries are not serious and there will be no scars.

(A wound closes

But you can’t see inside

What did you expect 

It’s too late to start again)

Chaivat stares at the walls of the hospital and just wants to vomit, and it’s not the smell of disinfectant, the reflection of needles, or the vision of other’s blood: it’s the view of his son’s back, his wrists, his knees, his lips (and fuck Type is eleven years old, eleven fucking years old, where is a bathroom, I have to vomit), but also the monotonous tone of doctors, their false professionalism, the ease with which they discuss anal injuries and absence of STDs like they’re ordering from a restaurant.

Chaivat sends everyone to hell and just asks to take his son home.

When they arrive, no one yet speaks, neither of dinner, nor of school, nor of football, nor of gossip: everything is a move on a rope, poised between two huge buildings, with the incessant fear of falling and crumbling to the ground; but Type does not collapse, still no, and let his father disinfect his wrists and bruises on his knees and back, let him put the ointment on his lips and neck.

When Chaivat makes to get close to the pelvis, full of anxiety but aware of the need to even sanitize there, Type stops breathing, begins to scream, and it’s all a chorus of "Please, please, please, please, no, it hurts, no, please, Mom, Dad, Mom, I’ll do whatever you want but not this!"; Chaivat remains with his waxed finger in mid-air, and what is left of his heart shutters.

Holding him steady, they manage to treat him there too, between tears and groans, and, really, Chaivat no longer knows who the cry is, if his, his wife or his son; and when they end, Type remains relaxed, stretched out like a starfish, motionless, mute, with glassy eyes, and just whispers: “Now, please, can you let me go?”.

Kannika flees to the kitchen. Chaivat collapses to the ground against the wall.

You fucking gays.

(When he finds out about Tharn and his son, it takes him all the courage in the world to open a computer and learn about what sex is like between two men. And the more he reads, the more the desire to kill that profiteering farang grows.

It’s gonna take him seven years and a hard fight with his son-in-law to figure out that Tharn would cut off his arm rather than hurt his son. Or his heart, as in that case)

Type begins to pee in bed, and he is too tired to be ashamed of it, the days that already mingle with each other, and a body that no longer seems to belong to him; his mother changes pillowcases and blankets at night when his son is destroyed, and he is forced to give way to deep sleep, free from his own intimate torments.  

Chaivat can lift him, hold him and cradle him, while his wife diligently removes the dirty linen and replaces it with the clean one.

Kannika doesn’t remember the last time she cradled her son with a lullaby or caught him peeing in bed, but she’s certain that, at eleven, these things don’t have to happen.

(When Tharn gets on stage, guitar in hand, Type starts crying, and really, really, he’s been tearing all day.

"Did he write it for you?" Kannika asks

"Kind of," her son says, "it’s my lullaby, for when even he can’t save me.”

Tharn gets off the stage, and Kannika holds him tight.

"You saved this family." She says)

Type leaves Pa-ngam that most of the wounds are gone. Every now and then his wrists itch, but it is a phantom pain, the echo of horrors that he desperately tries to forget, and that he prays do not follow him to Bangkok. He has only one scar left, but it’s so small that no one cares: a small cut on the bottom of his back, where the strings of his wrists were rubbing, back and forth, back and forth, back and fucking forth.

Type breathes and flies to a new life.

(Tharn’s the only one he shows it to. They are already casual lovers, Type still tries to convince himself that it’s just a sex thing and Tharn looks at him as if he holds the moon, the sun, and the stars. He shows it to him in a moment of weakness, shaken by the orgasm and all those crazy feelings that scare him every time he thinks of the other. He points it out to him slightly, and Tharn keeps staring at him, an indecipherable expression. Then he kisses it, once, twice, three times.

"You’re the strongest person I know," he says.

"You’re the one who makes me strong" he would have wanted to answer.

And instead, he kisses him. And silences his heart once and for all. )

Type grows quite well, at least on a physical level. Indeed more than discreetly.

Type enters puberty being a beautiful guy, with a dry and proportionate physique, and has nothing to be ashamed of.

(Yes, he has)

And yet Type never takes off his shirt, not even once, not even under the most scorching sun, and at fifteen, while his friends take a bath and try to attract as many girls as possible, he stays on the beach, with a light polo shirt to cover his back, Khom keeping him company.

No matter how much his friends call him, or how hard the sun hits, he never takes off his shirt, and he never takes a bath; none of his friends make fun of him, fortunately, and Chaivat is proud of the bond these guys have, and the candour they use with his son, never mentioning his trauma.

Then, one year, when Type’s just celebrated his 16th birthday, something happens.

In fact, despite the stories about him, the rumors that run despite years have passed, despite the aura of melancholy and anger that seems to surround him, Type is a magnet for girls, who, naively, see in him a small lost child to save, or even, a hot little morsel to add to their list of suitors.

Amp is no exception.

He approaches him one evening, during one of the many beach parties that animate Friday nights in Pa-ngam, and, flirtatious, tries to get offered a drink; Type, buried deep the traumas of when he was a child, now apparently free from his scars, gives her a free hand: she’s a pretty girl, easy-going, who generously rewards her partners, so why not?

He pours her drinks, and they start chatting: he tells her about life in the big city, the possibilities of the Capitol, his interests, he compliments her, and laughs at her jokes; the girl, on the other hand, curls her perfect hair around her finger, touches him on the arm, on the head, on the face, and already foresees the fun that awaits her with the young troubled boy who escaped into Bangkok.

Chaivat, who has made his lido available for the occasion, looks at them from a distance and rejoices to see how much Type has relaxed over time, and how much he has grown over the years away from home: he does not demand that with that girl there is something serious, but it’s nice to find out that his son is no longer afraid of intimacy, and rather that he researches, and researches in women.

( For the umpteenth time dad, I still like women, only I also like men. It’s called bisexuality.

I call it being undecided and surrendering to the first that passes.

Hey! It’s my fiance you’re talking about! Give it up.

How long till the wedding?

A week…

So there’s still time to call it off, right?

Dad, I’m still here…

You shut up, nobody asked for your opinion, pale face!

Chaivat! Leave Tharn alone and come to wash the dishes! )

And again, his dreams are shattered.

And again, he is powerless while his son is trampled, without any real fault of his own.

It just so happens that the girl, definitely not a saint at this point, already has a boyfriend, Nueng, who badly bears the attentions of Type and the chatter that are exchanging the two; this situation arises a quarrel, a simple fistfight between two teenagers in full hormonal crisis, a thing you expect to see every day, and Chaivat worries, yes, but he takes it out laughing. After all, his son must live this experience too, right?

Only that things get more serious, with Nueng forcefully ripping off Type’s shirt, on his back, and slamming it face down on the sand; Chaivat does not remember precisely the words, his mind clouded by anger and fear for what is revealing this quarrel, but he clearly distinguishes the words "scarred", "ruined", "cocksucker", "bitch", "faggot", "You liked it right? How much did he go down your throat, right? How much did you enjoy, you filthy, frigid virgin, how much did you beg for?”.

Chaivat sees red, but so red, that he can not move, while everyone, including him, watch Type being humiliated, on all fours on the sand, vulnerable and exposed.

His son finally reacts, his father manages to see him, and the fight ends with Nueng bleeding to the ground, and Type, the shirt still open on the back, with the wind caressing the scar, victorious over him, shouting the most poisonous insults, blood on his hands and face.

And if he cries himself to sleep that night, a litany of "who would want me?”, his father ignores, wants to ignore.

Tharn doesn’t do it.

Because Tharn, who is a pale face, a gay, a converter of pure souls, is also a disgustingly brave, proud, proud, disgustingly protective man with those he loves, a war machine.

Tharn never yields: to Chaivat, to Kannika, to the professors of his faculty, to his parents, to his enemies, to Type; in hindsight, after many years, Chaivat really admires his son-in-law for how he loved Type in silence, without ever losing his hopes, waiting for him to turn around and finally realize that they were meant to be together.

But for now, Chaivat hates Tharn.

He hates him because he is a pale face, a bloody faggot, but also because he is the only one able to lull his son in his sleep and protect him from the evils of the world; he himself is a witness, during one of his son’s visit.

One day, in Pa-ngam, everyone talks about it: everyone talks about the mysterious farang, blood mixed as it seems, that the night before knocked out and humiliated the scion of the Arponsutinang family. A quarrel, it is murmured, born after he had previously insulted the young Type Phawattakun, his childhood enemy.

("And so, in the end, you like cock, right Type? It was so when you were eleven, I’m happy to see that nothing has changed”

"Go away Nueng, I have nothing to say to you”

“But I have… actually farang, I have something to say to you. You seem like a nice guy, and judging by the watch and the clothes you wear, you’re also very rich. Couldn’t you find something better? Obviously not a girl, I know people like you are now diverted and lost forever, but at least a new and intact hole? That has not already been used-“

Nueng doesn’t finish that sentence. And if he ever manages to use his jaw normally, it is a fact that nobody is allowed to know.

But that’s when Type decides he’ll never leave Tharn, even though the world falls and the universe ends. That’s when Type gives a shit and kisses his boyfriend, his wonderful, caring, and beautiful boyfriend, in front of everyone. He doesn’t care about rumors, giggles, gossip, he doesn’t care about anyone. Whatever happens, Tharn will never abandon him. And he will forever send away the nightmares. )

Everyone talks about the mysterious farang, and for a moment, a tiny moment just perceptible, Chaivat is proud of, what’s again?, his son-in-law. But it’s an instant sensation, which lasts very little.

No matter one of them protected his son, Chaivat will still hate pale faces.

And he’s gonna keep hating Tharn, too, because he’s a pale face, because he’s gay, because he’s thoughtful and brave.

Or maybe he’s just ashamed.

Had he managed once, just once, to protect his son.

Chapter Text

Now that Chaivat is constantly dealing with one of them, he’s definitely convinced that he hates and will forever hate pale faces. He hates their manners, their gestures, the movement of their hands and arms, the musicality they convey, almost as if they are playing an invisible violin; he hates the trust their presence conveys, the tranquility they seem to release, a delicate perennial scent that calms those around them.

He hates that even Type is affected by this.

And if he stopped for a second, just a second, thinking about it, he would realize how immature and childish his attitude is; but to think, was never his strong suit. For years now, Chaivat has been a twisted man, accustomed to being guided by passions and feelings, so lost in his impulsiveness, to have abandoned forever logic. He’s not able to think, he can’t think, and maybe deep down, he knows he doesn’t want to think.

(He finally gives in. It’s been three years since Type left, and Chaivat finally gives out. He listens to his wife for once and decides it’s time to talk to someone about the whole thing: someone who, according to Kannika, can make him realize the why and the how of what happened to his son, and his role as a father.

"Why do you think it’s your fault?" He’s asked.

Because I didn’t watch him the way I should, because I didn’t protect him the way I should, because I didn’t defend him the way I could; Chaivat reflects, sitting there for minutes, staring at a mahogany desk, but not paying attention to the person behind it.

"Because yes" He answers. He gets up and leaves.

"A waste of money" is all he can say to his wife.

And if the guilt comes back even stronger when he finds out that it took six months, six ridiculous months, to another person, a stranger, to save Type, he doesn’t tell anyone. )

His wife calls him ridiculous, his sister calls him ridiculous, his aunt calls him ridiculous; even Type, dark in face, angry and frustrated, calls him ridiculous. "Why don’t you accept the fact that someone might love me?" He yells at him, and Chaivat doesn’t know what to say to him. It’s been four years since he found out about his son’s affair, and he still can’t get over it.

He knows he’s ridiculous, he’s not stupid, he’s not naive, he knows he’s ridiculous and he’s hurting everyone with his attitude; he knows he’s ridiculous, but he’s afraid of what might happen if, after a long time, he finally rekindled his brain and rationalized his behavior. After years of running away from guilt, from his heart, from reality itself, he doesn’t know what could happen if he stopped and opened Pandora’s box.

He is too tired. At almost sixty, Chaivat is too exhausted to take stock of his life, even if, honestly, he knows what would come out of it; behind that sarcastic laughter, the strong comments, and the determination with which he runs the resort, there’s a desperate need to keep the pieces of his life together, a frenzy that drives him to keep himself constantly occupied. Chaivat needs noise, din, dirty arms, and callous hands for too much manual labor, he needs to fight, to scream and shout, he needs to move and never sit down; he needs to be distracted enough not to be frightened by his own mind, 'Cause if he gives in if he lets in even the slightest glimmer, the house of cards he’s hard-wired will collapse. 

For a man with only two certainties, family and work, it’s worth sacrificing everything for their safety.

(When he and Kannika decide to buy and renovate that house, they begin to fill it with photographs; on the walls, on the shelves, on the tables, near the flower pots, and next to the books on the bedside table. Photos of their wedding, their family, their grandparents, the places they had visited and the most famous clients; photos of Type, just born, at two years old while trying to walk, at his first football match, photos with Khom and the rest of his friends, photos of him at ten years old, happy, while swimming in the sea.

But there is a wall at the entrance, just before the stairs leading to the second floor, extraordinarily empty: Chaivat and Kannika never try to fill it, and no one has ever understood why.

No one has ever understood it, and everyone is wondering, also asking why the almost total absence of photos of Type being bigger and grown-up; Tharn is the only one to ask, one of the first times that he accompanies Type on his island, still too shy, but happy to talk to his future mother-in-law.

Kannika responds by looking down at him, the remorse that transpires from his every gesture: she replies that, at the time, it hurt too much, having photos of his son without having been there with him to live those moments, and that she and her husband left the wall empty, precisely the one at the entrance because they needed something to remind them of their biggest mistake.

Years later, Tharn shows up at their house, a large frame in hand. Without saying anything to anyone, he heads to that wall and hangs it, revealing the photo of them, his family and Type’s, at their wedding.

"For what it’s worth, thank you" he says.

Chaivat doesn’t know what he’s thanking them for, but for the first time in years, that wall doesn’t scare him anymore. )

Chaivat is a square man, resolute in his decisions and his judgments, he knows his role in society and the family: he knows what taxes to pay and the repair work that the resort needs, he knows that he must be attentive to waste and online reviews, he knows when to call the suppliers and when to scold his employees. He knows what he likes and what he doesn’t, he knows what his favorite dishes are and the drinks he just can’t stand, he knows who to trust and who to keep away from. He knows he can count on his family and his wife. He knows he’s a husband. He knows he’s a father. He knows he’s a man.

Chaivat is a square man, but suddenly he’s not.

And it’s not as sudden a change as you’d expect, far from it: it takes him years to understand the true weight of Type’s situation on his psyche, how everything changed him in the depths. When he stops being strong for everyone when he stops being husband, father, man, he gets so scared, what he sees terrifies him, and that’s where he starts running.

He goes around his island, among his people, among his friends, and no longer knows who to trust, not when everyone seems to stare at him incessantly, and he just wants to turn around and send them all to hell; his head turns, his eyes fog, his knees give out, but he hears everything: the hands that point to him, the voices that pity him, the jokes that disparage him - him, his wife, and his son. He hears at least ten different versions of the story, Type going from being a poor helpless, a victim of events, to a pawn in the hands of parents who have exploited him to make some money, he feels pity, malevolence, gossip, curiosity, and what frightens him is the awareness that those people are the same with whom he grew up, who has always respected and, apparently, admired him.

Chaivat is 40 years old when he has his first panic attack, but he can’t remember anything.

(One of the passers-by seems to notice his presence, catches him in the air and yells at the crowd to call an ambulance.

Chaivat won’t stop babbling about the whole trip.

"I’m scared, I’m afraid he’ll never come back.”

No one understands the subject of that sentence, but when they reveal it to the wife, she just stops and nods.

"Me too, Chaivat" is the only thing they hear her whispering, sitting next to her husband, her forehead resting on their folded hands. )

He needs help, he knows this, he needs listening and patience, he needs someone to rationalize for him the whole story and his own feelings; but at the same time, he needs serenity: he must be able to receive his son’s phone calls without that constant knot in his throat and the desire to escape as far as possible. He wants to hear him talk about his friends, his days, his matches, without that ferocious and desperate impulse to beg him, to beg him to come back, to forgive him, to forget, to leave everything behind. Chaivat is a selfish man, but he’s not that selfish.

So, the only thing he can do, besides trying hard to smile and be happy for his son, despite distance and absence, is to look for answers: if he can’t apologize to Type, if he can’t afford to ask for his time, his presence, at least he wants to be able to look him in the eye, with his nightmares and his fears, knowing the reason for all that violence. He wants to be able to say that it was worth it, to drive him away, to see him grow up far away, to be able to embrace him only three months a year.

He goes to jail.

He does not know where he finds courage, or better, patience: he wakes up one morning, kisses his wife on the cheek, and the thought of seeing that man, of asking for explanations, is the first to spring to his mind, but he waits; he prepares breakfast, wakes Kannika, and together they call Type: their son responds in a hoarse, sleepy voice, and it’s there that they discover that he has a fever, not so high, but his throat hurts and that day he can not go to school.

And it’s a really funny scene: Kannika and Chaivat, eleven hours away by car, full of panic and fear about something normal, nothing to worry about, while they explain in detail to the man’s aunt how to cure the son, and everything to do to make him feel better; the woman, despite the experience, lets them talk. He knows his nephew and his wife well, but most of all, he understands their attitude, and, despite having everything under control, gives them the satisfaction of taking care of their son in this way. She knows how much they need it.

Chaivat and Kannika close the conversation, and the silence falls, the joy of a few moments before now lost; halfway between frustration and impotence, the thought of visiting that worm comes back to flash in the mind of man. He needs answers, and he needs answers now.

Despite his wife’s protests, he goes to prison.

Chaivat hates pale faces. But this one, oh, he hates this one most of all.

It’s been three years, but Pho hasn’t changed a bit, and it fucking pisses him off.

His face is even paler, but his arms, his build, his chest, are as robust as before, maybe more, and if Chaivat pauses for a moment just to think about his son, the lost pounds, those days when he bent over and he could see his spine, those afternoons spent kneeling on the toilet, vomiting what little he had managed to eat, his blood froze. Pho is the same man he’s always been, the same scumbag, the same monster he was three years ago, he doesn’t seem to lose weight, he doesn’t seem to suffer, he doesn’t seem to be sick at all, and Chaivat can’t help but think that if really there is someone up there, to govern everything and every action, he must have a cruel sense of humor.

For entire minutes Chaivat does nothing else, he just looks at him, making comparisons between his condition and the life to which he, his wife, but above all, his son, are forced; in the end, he looks at him in the eye, and desires never to have done it.

(They’re on the beach, an ice bag pressed on both of their cheeks, the still heavy breather, sitting on the sand.

"Tell me something Tharn, I need to know.”

The boy turns to him, and really, Chaivat finds himself wondering how he could have hated him for so long, him and those eyes so sincere, so full of love.

"Why Type? Why him, after all, he had done to you?”

The boy turns, shakes his head, and chuckles to himself.

"Because despite everything, despite the insults, the way he treated me, the more I looked at him, the more I saw his fear. I looked him in the eye and I knew, I knew, that he needed to be heard. I’ll never say I saved him, no, Type is too brave and strong to be saved by someone. I just looked at him. And I get him. And I listened to him. I knew he was broken, I saw it from a mile away, but I never made him feel any different. When he finally opened up to me, I knew that if I left, I would break it for good. And I stayed.”

"Thank you, son, for everything”

Tharn looks like he’s about to cry.

Chaivat embraces him.

It’s all right. )

The images of that man’s pupils overlap for a moment with those of his son, their fear, their relief every time he returned to Bangkok, the way they were immobilized every time he needed to be treated, and Chaivat is afraid he might have another panic attack, but no, he doesn’t want to give that man any more satisfaction.

Their conversation is useless: Chaivat starts calmly, but in the end, he gets angry, and among the screams, he does nothing but asks him why his actions, why Type, why their own family, why his child, why, why, why, why, still why. Pho keeps quiet, no, even worse, he laughs. First between himself, then more visibly and at the end, in a loud way; laughs throughout their conversation, safe from Chaivat’s fists, separated from him by a glass barrier, his eyes with a grimace of challenge, without remorse, without fear, without guilt.

When was the last time you looked in the mirror and your eyes were free of guilt? When was the last time you heard your son laugh, a heartless, real, sincere, heartfelt laugh? You don’t remember.

"Kannika was right," he thinks "it was a waste of time to come here". So he gets up and goes to leave.

But he can’t. And he’s in serious danger of being sued.

It takes two guards to get him out of that room and prevent him from breaking the glass and the face of that man; it takes two guards and many prayers on their part, but in the end, Chaivat leaves.

( "Mr. Phawattakun!" For the first time that creep talks, and Chaivat turns to listen to him.

"One day I’ll get out of here, and I’ll still be young, I’ll still be alive. I’ll find your son and finish what I started”

Chaivat bleaches suddenly and tightens the edge of the table.

"You have ruined my life. And I will ruin yours. I will be your torment and your fear. Your son’s life will never be the same as mine. He’ll be afraid to leave his house.”

Chaivat does to answer, but Pho stops him.

"I know what you did, I know that you sent him away, my family told me. Let him stay in Bangkok, away from me. That’s even better, it will be you and your wife to suffer when he will no longer return home for the fear of meeting me.”

Chaivat throws a fist against the glass. )

He goes home and cries because that man has come to understand his greatest fear, that Type will never come home.

And when his son announces that he has a boyfriend, a male boyfriend, tall, handsome, but above all, a native of Bangkok, almost 780 kilometers far from home, his heart cracks a little; Chaivat knows what the strength of love is, he lived it on his skin, when Kannika herself left her city to stay with him: he remembers the nostalgic eyes of his wife and how she suffered from such separation.

Chaivat knows he's dramatic, is a fact established and definitely confirmed, and he knows very well that, with the comforts and facilities of this generation, it would be absurdly easy to stay in touch with his son, and he knows it would be very easy to come home to them whenever he wants: they live on an island, not on the Moon.
The fact is, he continues to repeat himself in the mind, that he feels that he has lost his son, that day of so many years ago, he feels that he has given up too easily his presence: he is aware that having brought him to Bangkok was an urgent necessity, but at the same time, he’s convinced he didn’t try hard enough, to keep him, to protect him, to care for him, to listen to him.

Sometimes it hurts so much to see him with Tharn, and it’s even worse when the perennial hatred he feels towards the farang is replaced by a note of affection: and it’s not the sweet words he whispers to his son or the way he always seems to give him victory; It’s the details that no one notices and that he, in his crusade of hate, can do no other than notice.

It’s the way they fall asleep, whether it’s on the bed, on the deck chair by the sea, or on the sofa at the entrance, Tharn always holding him, without letting him go, and Type curling up in the recess of his neck, and never, ever, letting go of their hands. And when Chaivat tries to move them, to distance them, Type is always agitated, until his boyfriend comes back to hold him, stronger than before, and Type sniffs Tharn, as if to calm himself down.

It's that hand always placed on the bottom of his son's back, just above the scar, to hide it from prying eyes; it's the way Tharn kisses it, when no one notices, just lifting Type's shirt, receiving a nice insult back.

It’s how they gravitate around each other, they insult each other, they repel each other, they argue over nonsense, and then they can’t stay apart, and Tharn always gives in first, and Type still admits his mistakes.

It is the confidence that inspire each other, Type who is not ashamed to hold his hand, to sit in his arms, to cuddle him when he can; it's Tharn who never complains if in public this affection fails, and waits patiently for Type, waiting for him to feel at ease.

It’s the way they complement each other’s chores at home and in life; it’s the way Tharn is always the first fan of Type, encouraging him to study, graduate, take his master’s degree, never bothered by afternoons and evenings, ruined to be on books.

It’s how their voices change.

It is Type who has returned to what he was before, with his torments and fears, but also his hero ready to save him.

It’s the way, Chaivat will find out later, they’ll be willing to give up what they have to make sure the other one gets the best.

(One night, beer in hand and the sea breeze to keep them company, Type takes it out; it’s the day before the wedding and it has been all day that his son doesn’t seem to be well, so much so that Chaivat is afraid that he might have reconsidered.

But it's there that the man really realizes how much his son has grown up, and how much his attempts to push the two boys away have always been in vain; it’s the middle of the night and Type tells him about Lhong, the beginnings of their relationship, and all those doubts that seem to give him no rest, even after almost ten years of relationship. 

"I feel like I’ve been waiting for the other shoe to drop, you know? And at first, it was fucking hard to live with that feeling. We were happy, we spent every moment together, but it was never enough, I wasn’t. And strangely, I didn’t feel up to it, not because of what had happened to me, but because of the way I behaved: everyone was talking about how sweet, helpful, attentive he was, and I was just the vulgar, foul-mouthed hothead that trapped him in a dead-end relationship. Let alone, in the early days, I wouldn’t let him hold my hand in public.
When I found out what had happened to Tar, deep down I was happy: Tharn would come back with him, and he would have a happier and more relaxed life. I was ready for anything you know? I kissed him, and I knew it would be the last time. I hugged him, and I knew I would never do it again. I... m-made love to him, and I couldn’t let him go, and I kept wondering when I’d ever feel so safe, but I finally broke away from him. And then I realized how much I loved him.
Lhong had to be unmasked and Tar rehabilitated: Tharn would get his soul mate back, and I would be fine with it. I would have loved him from a distance, in silence, I would have watched him build a life with someone who wasn’t me, and I would have been fine with that. It was supposed to be fine.
But he, stubborn as a mule, stayed with me, took me home, to our house, cured my wounds, and embraced me all night.
He’s too good, you know? It’s too easy. I don’t understand what he sees in me, why he wants to marry me so badly, why he wants to be stuck with this hothead his whole life. He could have whoever he wants, and he chose the troubled guy..." )

Chaivat hates the pale faces, hates their memory and their presence, hates that it was their presence that took away his son, first the man who raped him, then the man who loved him, because Chaivat knows that Type would be willing to follow Tharn even at the end of the world, just to not leave him.

(What he doesn’t know is that for Tharn it’s the same...)

So, he can’t be more than happy when Type comes home, revealing that he had a big fight with his boyfriend and that their relationship is hanging by a thread: he self-convinces that, without that farang in the way, Type finally decides to go home and make up for the lost time. He is even happier when Type announces that he wants to take the path to become a monk, a desire his parents have always had.

(If he blatantly ignores Type’s sad glances, the way he seems to be broken, and the shiny eyes he hides, if he ignores the fact that his nightmares have returned, no one can blame him. His son is finally home.

Type cries when no one sees him, and at night he casually calls Tharn’s name, tightens the pillowcases, and moves between the blankets. All he does is listen to the same song on his cell phone, sweet words that speak of oaths, worlds that seem different, and hands that must never let go. He looks at his hand, squeezes it, and gets even more overshadowed.

But his father doesn’t care. His son is home)

Chaivat really hates Tharn, he is convinced; and he hates him, even more, when he sees him, a bag on his shoulder, at the gates of his house. He hates him when he sees him and his son kissing and making peace. He hates him when he does not protest and opposes to Type’s monkhood, leaving him his choices. He hates him when he sits and has dinner with them and never lets go of his son’s hand. But he fucking hates him, detests him, repulses him, when his son gets up and announces, with all the calm of the world, his eyes shining: "Tharn and I are getting married”.

He sees the ring on his finger and freaks out.

The screams start before he can control them.

Chaivat is now convinced he hates pale faces, first of all, his son’s fiancé.

He hates Tharn because when he looks at his son, it's as if the world disappeared and nothing matters more than his desires; he hates him because for Type it is the same.

He hates him because he’s going to take Type away, and Chaivat could never really have him for himself.

After a lifetime of being afraid of losing his son, now he’s really losing him.

And Tharn will pay for it.

Chapter Text

Tharn knows he has a pale face: it is the first thing he sees in the morning (or the second, if we count Type’s face just awake), to frame his eyes, mouth, nose. It is the same skin that since childhood is a cause of compliments and pinches on the cheeks, of second glances, of caresses and brushed kisses. It is his mixed heritage, the Caucasian and Eastern characters united in its connotations when he looks at the mirror to see the faces of his parents merging in one smile.

Tharn knows that he has light skin and that he loves a dark boy, with a caramelized, sun-kissed skin, so different from his own, so burnt, rough, full of particularity, so imperfect, but at the same time so true compared to his own. Tharn knows he loves a dark-skinned boy, and he can’t help but love him even more for it, not when he takes him and their hands seem made to clench harmoniously, yin and yang, not when their bodies seem ethereal and harmonious, fused into one thing.

Tharn knows he loves a dark-skinned boy, and for a long time, he thinks he’s alone, the only one in love, and the only one who loves Type.

And while everyone, Techno especially, likes to describe his story, between him and Type, in a comical key, Tharn crazy of the dark-haired from the first moment, a victim of love at first sight in full swing, and Type, asshole, proud, reluctant to give in until the end, Tharn knows damn well that’s not true.

Tharn doesn’t believe in love at first sight, or rather, he doesn’t believe in it anymore: years of failed relationships, of heartless fucking, of broken hearts, have taught him that "love" is something that must be cured, cared for, it is something that requires time and effort, is to put yourself in the game completely, lights and shadows, is to be yourself, without being afraid to discover too much. And as melodramatic as it may sound, Tharn is 19 years old and has a hard time believing in love anymore.

("That’s not how it works."

"You can’t be so glued to me all the time."

"It was nice until I had fun."

"No! It’s not what you think!"

"I think I should take a break from you."

"You’re handsome, yes, but that’s all you’re good for."

"Let’s break up, Tharn, I cheated on you”)

Tharn has an immense library at home, in his father’s study: it's white, spacious, full of tomes and volumes of every shape, written in so many languages that the dust forms footprints on the shelf where they are placed, revealing which are the most read and even how often they are browsed; they are mostly his grandfather's books, an American businessman who fell madly in love with Thailand and its culture, so lost in his affection that he decided to leave a safe and uninvolved life in the United States to move to the other side of the world, and marry a woman from that part of the world, not caring about the contrary judgments, the whispers, and rumors about that farang, rich and wealthy, definitely without good intentions.

It is an adventurous love story, that of his grandparents, a colorful and detailed story, which in his house is used as an example of dedication and love, to explain that nothing can overcome a feeling when this is strong, lively, pulsating: it's a tale revealed with a hint of a smile, at Christmas lunches, on New Year’s Eve, during family meetings, the eyes of his dad who for a moment veil of sadness, and then deviate towards an amused grimace, to the memory of afternoons spent laughing with his American father, while he was imitating his father-in-law and describing the sacrifices made to set up that particular family. 

It is the same story that is repeated in Tharn once, twice, ten times, when he comes out with his brothers, with his parents, with his grandparents, with the rest of the family; the same phrases that are spoken with vehemence, both by Thorn and Tanya, as well as by his grandmother and his grandfather, proud in their eighty years, so unusual in accepting a gay grandson, as they were in their life and love story.

("Well, that means more girls for me! I can finally take you around with my friends without being afraid that you’ll steal all the pretty ones with this good-looking face!"

"Big brother, what exactly is wrong with that?"

"Baby, you owe me 2000 baht! I knew it!"

"I wanted you, I gave birth to you, I accept you as you are. I wouldn’t be worthy of being called a mother if I turned you down now that you needed me more"

"He has my DNA, surely, I recognize in him the desire to subvert the system."

"Oh my God, does this mean I have to teach you how to cook? But how, if you still always eat those four bland things!" )

Tharn learns from an early age what love is, learns it from an original but united family, so impeccable seen from the outside, rich, untouchable, but warm and strong inside; learns it from the books he reads, from the poems, from the epic tales of Western mythology, that his grandfather likes so much: love is to hear everything, everywhere, every little noise of the universe, nature, animals, insects, the noise of the sky, the sea and the air, is to feel the immensity of the world, try it, live it, taste it. Love is strength, vital, short-tempered, violent, hot, it is the desire to get out of bed, but also to go back, to start a new day, all over again; love is sleep, speed, then sleep again, movement, stop, get up, run, slow down, and run run run. Love is all this, it is never knowing how to feel, how to behave, what to do, and how to do it: love is to be afraid, have confidence, have concerns, have affection. Love is something that illuminates you from within, that realizes you, that adds meaning to all things, that makes you understand your place in the world definitively; love is to jump, knowing that you are not alone, is to remove every mask from the face, every good way, every agreeable, and breathe.

Love should be special, Tharn thinks, but maybe I’m not enough to deserve it.

(A scream destroys his sleep, and for the first time, he does not produce it. Type wakes up, realizing her boyfriend’s absence, and the light on in the bathroom.

Type runs, but he already knows what he’s gonna find.

And maybe it has to do with the fact that a 19-year-old boy doesn’t have to be responsible for such a big pain, maybe it has to do with that abandonment, the only friend, the only certainty he’s ever had, maybe it has to do with that fear, insane and sick, that no one can love him, despite trying to be perfect, yet Type spends all night sitting with his back against the tub and doesn’t complain.

"Never leave me"

Tharn repeats, while he tries to cover him with a towel, to keep him warm.

"You complete my life"

He says in sobs.

"You saved mine"

Type whispers it, but Tharn is already asleep, exhausted. )

When he meets Type, he doesn’t try that mysterious discharge associated with great loves, he doesn’t feel his knees shaking, nor his sight blurred, he just thinks "woah, what a handsome boy" and there he ends; Tharn has neither time nor desire for a love story, he’s tired and worn from the last breakup, still unable to take his and Tar's photos from his room, doing nothing but looking at them for hours, with his head full of if and but, divided between the instinct of self-guilt and the desire to rise again. He thinks Type is a handsome guy, he thinks he has a nice ass, he thinks he looks likable and they can become good roommates; but in a moment, everything goes to shit.

Despite an open and understanding family, Tharn has fought against homophobia all his life, struggling versus immature classmates and gossipy girls, against unfounded prejudices and unsolicited comments: it is the unfortunate fate of those who, like him, turn out different, maybe not better, but different, when being different is never a walk. It’s having to continually explain the truth about some, too many, preconceived, it’s having to specify to teammates and instructors that, no, no, he’s not going to harass the other guys in the gym locker room, thank you very much; it is having to deal with his teachers regarding these issues when he allows himself to speak about them in homework or writing exercises. It’s having to write songs and always change pronouns, too tired and annoyed to be able to explain to the audience why he’s gay, why he likes guys, why he can’t be normal.

("Do you know? There are at least 1,200 species in the animal world that practice homosexuality, and many of them remain loyal to same-sex partners throughout their lives. And yet, only one presents homophobia, the human one. In your opinion, who is really wrong?"

Lhong tells him this story a few days after coming-out when everything is very fresh and the questions are still many, almost like whispers and bad tongues.

Lhong tells their friends, their classmates, acquaintances, teachers, Tharn’s parents, girls, friends in the band: he tells anyone he meets, and that resembles to judge Tharn in some way.

Lhong tells everyone and Tharn hugs him every time.

What he wouldn’t do if he lost his best friend. )

He detests Type from that first insult: he just sees him, smells him, perceives him close to him, and anger begins to flow into his veins; and again, he does not hate the boy, also because he knows he is in front of an immature child, too lazy to detach himself from the masculine ideal inculcated by his parents and society. 

He doesn’t hate the boy, because it’s the same Type who makes stupid jokes, on serious topics, and makes him laugh for hours, it’s the same Type with whom sometimes he has lunch or dinner, with whom he talks about his favorite foods, their birthplace, music, cinema; it’s the same Type who invites him to football games, who beats Techno so hard and when he turns smiles in such a sweet way, so that it’s impossible not to say that he cares about him very much. It is the same Type who sometimes closes on himself, who never talks about his childhood, who asks the right questions and does not demand immediate answers.

Tharn hates the homophobe: he hates who or what made a boy so good, an emeritus imbecile, he hates having to return to the usual attacks, the usual phrases, the usual insults, he hates having to give the same answers, with the same vehemence and the same tone, he hates to be constantly forced to reclaim his right to love, he hates to be afraid, he hates to feel inappropriate, he hates that someone is inappropriate with him.

So he does the biggest fuck-up of his life.

(At the beginning it’s just a game, it’s to mislead a homophobic bully of having done something he judged "against nature", it’s to make fun of him and demoralize him, it’s to remove that air of challenge from his face.

At first, it’s a game, but suddenly it’s not.

That night, when he opens Type’s shirt and starts marking love bites around his neck, he’s too caught up in his evil plan to realize something’s wrong.

Type continues to whisper "Pho" with a choked tone, and a single tear drops from his eye; Type tightens his thighs tightly, but Tharn does not notice. )

Tharn begins to fall in love with Type when he begins to worry about him, and it’s been so long since he felt this need, that he struggles to connect it to love itself, but eventually he understands and comes back to feel something; he’s still clinging to the happy days he spent with Tar, but he can’t find the time to think about it, not like before. Not when his nights are as long as hospital shifts, not when Type keeps him awake, with moaning, words, murmuring, and then tears, tears, still tears, not when he finds him, morning after morning, staring at the void in front of him, the red and worn pupils, the mouth closed, an airtight line. Tharn begins to connect the pieces, the doubts of Techno, the broken phrases he hears at night, the reluctance of Type to be touched on any occasion, the way he faces the nightmares with resignation as if it were not the first time.

Tharn’s falling in love and he’s definitely fucked.

But he doesn’t stop to think about it.

He wants Type to get better and he wants it to happen fast.

And again everything gets worse, the gossip about his roommate starts to spread, and Tharn starts to get scared; no matter how many times he tries to get him to eat, how much care he has, or how many times he tries to call him, Type refuses to leave his bed, and his sleep becomes more and more disturbed.

(The first time he tries to calm him down, simply touching or massaging his temples, he is still convinced that he is helping a friend, a friend who hates and despises him, but still a friend.

Type talks about soccer balls and parks, then about dust and tingling, tightens his legs tightly and curls up on one side; Tharn touches his hair, a caress just hinted at, and for a second, a thousandth of a second, the other guy relaxes. Then Tharn lifts his hand and he trembles again.

Tharn despises his roommate, and yet spends whole nights caressing his temples, murmuring melodies in his ear, feeling blank, but satisfied, the moment he returns to sleep in his bed.

Tharn knows that something is changing when lack of sleep does not disturb him.

But he knows, with absolute certainty, that he's annihilated when, in his sleep, Type begins to call his name.

Tharn kisses him, right between the eyebrows, and decides that he doesn't want an easy life. )

When he discovers the truth about the other, he tries the irrepressible instinct to vomit, but he contains, Type in his arms with his sobs, his fears, his past, his monsters, Type that suddenly, becomes a priority; Type that lets itself be embraced and at that moment is the most important thing in his life, he’s the only purpose, the only end, the only person left on Earth. Type, who at a certain point stops crying, some sobs mentioned, shakes his head in the hollow of his neck and tightens stronger, that embraces him with arms and legs, that whispers to him "tomorrow we can go back to hate each other, now I need you”.

And Tharn knows he’s fucked the moment that his head touches the pillow, the other guy trapped in his arms, while he keeps whispering to him "it’s all over, Pho is not there, it’s just me, I will protect you, I’m here, I won’t let you go".

He doesn’t fall in love with his roommate when he sees his fears, his torments, when he understands his nature or his motivations, he falls in love with him the first time they sleep together: after a life spent hearing about colors, emotions, foster care, of complicity, he knows he has found it, and in the most unthinkable individual. And this revelation upsets him, shakes him from within, so much so that he can’t sleep that night, and stays asleep, reassuring Type when he gets agitated again, and reflecting on his masochism. Falling in love with a homophobe, TV show stuff. 

But it all seems so easy, so natural, and Tharn really can’t explain too much, the way their heights fit, their bodies that seem to fit perfectly, the pattern of their skins, how they seem to gravitate toward each other, whether they’re arguing or sleeping. It is this unknown impulse of protection that pervades him, never felt so strong, even with Tar, small and helpless Tar, it is the perennial worry that has plagued him in recent days, the desire to know what Type is doing, if Type is well, if he is smiling, if he's crying or having nightmares. It is the strangled voice with which Type pronounced his name, next to that of his parents, as if despite hatred and spite, he confided blindly to him, and the fact that he can never hurt him; it is the promise that Tharn makes, at dawn, half asleep, to always protect Type and never abandon him.

Tharn is nineteen years old, has a general distrust of love, but feels more attached to this stranger than ever before.

(He finally realizes that what he feels for Type is love, when he manages to free himself from the photos of Tar, his gifts, and his trinkets.

And he feels brave again, able to love again. )

Too bad it’s not the same for Type.

Maybe love isn’t for everyone, maybe he’s not made for love, maybe he was crazy, maybe not: Tharn thinks a lot of things and his head hurts, his heart hurts, his eyelids, his throat, his hands, it hurts to hear, it hurts to be so vulnerable, so open with his feelings, so willing to give everything of himself, without receiving anything in return. 

No one ever told him that loving Type would be easy, but God, he didn’t even think it would be that hard, and yet he can’t help blaming himself: he wanted that guy, that situation, he gave in to that sex story, to live repressing his feelings, with the slightest hope that one day the other will reciprocate, he saw gestures of love in moves of opportunism, he wanted to hold together a relationship destined to end even before blossoming.

He drinks, he drinks again, he drinks everything, he swallows, he laughs at himself, at his loneliness, he laughs at his eyes, his mouth, his hair, his appearance, his white, flawless skin, his fascination with others, which is not enough to make up for the other weaknesses, an aspect able to attract but not to convince to stay; how much waste.

He drinks and Type’s eyes flash in his face, frightened, full of tears, relieved to meet his own, then again fierce and angry, but able to soften; veiled eyes, lost, full of desire, the same eyes that strip him every night and that call him before coming, demanding his presence, his attention. Uncertain eyes, rare but present, when staring at Tharn studying, playing, or simply breathing, eyes that manifest when Tharn allows himself to dare and exceeds the unspoken boundaries of their pseudo-relationship; the same eyes that say "thank you" after a sleepless night running away from nightmares.

The same eyes that can destroy him.

(It takes him every ounce of strength he has in his body not to run looking for him when he discovers the existence of Puifai; it takes him the dignity and the little pride he has left, but he waits for him in his room.

It’s not the slap that hurts him, but the words he speaks to Type himself, words he is ashamed of the same moment he shouts them; not only do they hurt him, but they terrify him, because the last time he felt this pain, that he clung to everything he had so he didn’t lose something, it didn’t end well.

And really, Tharn is tired of living to feel, without anyone to catch him when he falls, is tired of deserving loneliness. )

(It takes him every ounce of strength he has in his body not to choke him, or worse, burst into tears in his face, a few days later, when Type clarifies his intentions with the girl.

Tharn remains there, the desire to love him and to be able to tell him pinching his fingers, a void at the height of the sternum, a weight on his diaphragm that blocks his breath and brings him back to all his breaks, to all the apologies, betrayals, lack of respect, the afternoons spent browsing through family albums hoping to find his soul mate, with whom to finally feel all the emotions that were taught him.

If he thought he loved Type before, now he knows he loves him.

Because the hardest thing is not to smile at him, wish him the best and advise him on how to impress the girl, indeed that’s the easy part, it just takes a huge effort not to tear at least a little, but in the end, it does it.

The hardest thing is to go back to his bed, a bed that smells like them, with Type three feet away from him still wearing one of Tharn's tank tops, for fuck’s sake, and pretending not to feel anything; the matter is to start making rational programs, trying to figure out how to adapt to the future couple and their rhythms, imagine the shifts in the room so that Type can take her there and spend time with her, without Tharn bothering them. It’s trying to figure out how to avoid their Instagram posts or their campus appointments, how to manage their groups from now on, their interactions, their relationships: it’s trying to actually imagine life without Type, life without that rickety relationship, but still a life with Type, with someone to come back to every night.

It’s wondering how to explain to Puifai how to make Type sleep, how to react to his nightmares and tremors, and to his abruptness: it’s explaining to her that she must put her hands on his shoulders first, massaging them slowly, and then push it out of the way until he is totally incorporated into an embrace, the faces placed in front of them; it's to show her how to caress his hair, better if with the chin or the cheeks, and how to stretch his temples or the wrinkle between the eyebrows, it's to teach her all the lullabies to whisper in his ear, or the words best suited to calm him down.

It’s to hope she can accept this side of Type.

It’s to hope she’s not afraid of the dark.

When he stops feeling, welcoming emotions, lost in his rationalizations, he apprehends another thing about love: the other comes first.

Tharn starts to forget everything: the confessions under the covers, the hugs, the kisses, the marks on the wrists, and the scar on the back, he forgets the promise to help him with therapy and human relationships, he forgets groans, caresses, prayers, his perfume, every promise.

He stops hearing anything and stops thinking about everything.

Only much later, when he succumbs to sleep and loses all inhibition, one hears him murmuring a little hinted "Type".

The interested party hears him, still awake because of Puifai and his own thoughts, and approaches the bed of the other, who in the meantime has turned.

Tharn has tears on his cheeks, but a smile on his mouth.

"Type" repeats again. 

"I'm letting you go”)

(He decides to leave him for good, but then he laughs because there hasn't ever been a relationship between them.

He decides to stop being used, to be good only for sex.

He decides to love himself a little after a life spent devoted to others.

He decides that even this time, he will sacrifice himself.

He decides many things, and deep down he hopes that his turn to be loved will come.

He decides a lot of things, but he knows, he knows, he’ll run to Type if he ever needs it.

And he hates himself for it. )

Those eyes can destroy him, but can also save him.

("You are mine"

"I’ve always been yours"

"You have no right to leave me."

"I never wanted it"

"I couldn’t stop thinking about you, she talked, but I just wanted you to be there, to eat with me, to fight over the huge amount of chili sauce I put on rice and your Sprite addiction."

"I’m addicted to you"

"I’m afraid to be without you"

"Me too"

"Nightmares don’t come back if I’m with you, why? Why is it so different with you? I’ve known you for six months and I’ve never felt as safe as with you."

"I don’t know, but I’m not going anywhere."

"Please, I beg you"

"I promise you that"

"I’m not leaving you anymore"

"I will never let you leave me again” )

Tharn has a perfect life, a family that loves him, a guaranteed wealth, the acceptance of every person who surrounds him; he has long and deep eyes, a proportionate nose, fine hair, soft and fashionable. He has clear, vitreous, pearly skin, so perfect that many people wonder if he is actually an angel, but he is far from perfect.

Tharn is deeply afraid of love, although he has never spared himself in trying it and in letting himself be hurt: Tharn wants to try, feel, seek that connection that his grandparents talked about, and with which they have revolutionized their world.

Tharn thinks he has found it in a dark-skinned boy, no, he knows he has found it, in the night and the day, in the pain and the happiness, in the warmth and the coldness, in the complex and twisted road that was their love story; he finds it in the misunderstandings, in the problems of the student and the adult, he finds it despite resistance, pain, and memory, he finds it in separation and closeness.

Tharn, a pale face, finds love in a dark-skinned boy, and he knows he’ll never find it again.

And if he has to fight against his father-in-law, at 26 years old, to protect this love, so be it.

He stopped giving up on Type.

He stopped giving up on himself.