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Nice was… well, nice . As Naruhodou Ryuunosuke debated whether that choice of words was too flat and sparse to actually pen in his travel journal, he idly shifted his feet under the table of the seaside cafe that they had chosen to have lunch in, a little restless, and then the server arrived at the table and set before him two cups of coffee.
“Hi, erm, bonjour ,” he tried in French instead, and the server looked at him not unkindly and indicated that he understood English. Sighing in relief, he continued, “Uh, would you happen to know if the gentleman who was with me is still on the phone?”
“He is still preoccupied, I am afraid,” was the apologetic answer. “However, sir, would you like to have anything additional to cap off your meal?”
“Um…” Ryuunosuke hopefully eyed the menu card that was presented to him, and then unable to resist the row of desserts, he said, “I would like a chocolate dacquoise , please.”
“And for your companion?”
“No, he usually doesn’t have anything with his coffee. But thank you.”
The server inclined his head, and Ryuunosuke watched his figure weave past tables and finally disappear into the back of the house before turning his attention back to the few sentences that he had already written on the journal that he had brought with him. He had developed the habit of taking the little notebook with him everywhere, and jotting down a few sentences about the sights that he was seeing so that even without the gift of sketching, he could take it home with him. He wrote the entire thing in English because Barok liked reading it aloud sometimes, whenever they just lounge in the hotel in the evenings and even card games or wine seemed inadequate to fully relax. He would read out whole entries, which at first embarrassed Ryuunosuke because he deemed his prose not good enough yet, but eventually, after weeks and also lots of praise and coaxing, he would sometimes ask Barok of his own accord to read back the entries of the day, and he would close his eyes, listen to Barok’s elegant cadence, and sear all of the sights described therein on his brain.
21 August 19—.
One of the beauties of Nice is that when you gaze at the place where the sea and the sky meet, you will find out that you do not truly know what the color blue actually means until that profound moment. They say that no sight in the world is fairer than that of your homeland, but never have I seen a sky as shockingly sapphire-like as that of the sky above Nice, and the Mediterranean sea, like a huge, boundless mirror, reflects it in its calm, graceful waves.
We had lunch in one of the many restaurants that dotted the Promenade des Anglais; Barok swears by it, and I trust his picky palate enough that I allowed him to drag me here even though the sun was high in the sky and my shirt was soaked through in all kinds of embarrassing places when we finally arrived. Apparently, as a child, his family also used to go to this place during the summer holidays, and the owner already knew Barok by sight and ushered us to what probably was the best table in the house. We were outside on the deck and looking upon the tourists walking up and down the Promenade as we drank excellent wine and I partook of a very good, if unusual fish dish—Barok told me how it was called, but I’ll have to ask him how to spell it once he gets back.
That reminds me, but as we were finishing our entrées, the server had come up to our table and whispered something urgently into Barok’s ear. I was a little worried, but Barok only assured me that it was an important call that he had been waiting for from Scotland Yard about some case that he had been following for the better part of two weeks now, and that while he won’t be prosecuting the case himself, the young prosecutor who was actually in charge of it was asking for his advice on it, and—
“I’m sorry for leaving you be,” Barok’s warm voice was in his ear, suddenly, and Ryuunosuke had to wonder if he was blushing furiously as he felt the quick, affectionate squeeze on his shoulder before the prosecutor resumed his seat at the table and frowned at his lukewarm coffee. “I hope you haven’t been dreadfully bored in the interim.”
“How can I be bored? There’s so much to see.” And in this, Ryuunosuke was a hundred percent accurate; one thing that Nice didn’t seem to have a shortage of is people, and there was nothing more entertaining, perhaps, to just sit back and to study this interesting microcosm of humanity on the miles and miles of coast. “How was the call, by the way?”
“Well, everything is falling in place,” Barok murmured noncommittally, obviously unable to say anything more specific, and Ryuunosuke pretended to understand and nodded somberly as he sipped his coffee and wrote another line in the journal. The blue ink of his fountain pen seemed oddly appropriate to write with when it comes to Nice, he realized, and smiled a little at his own observation. Barok, who was either too shy or too disinterested to ask about his companion’s enigmatic expression, instead sat back in his chair and observed Ryuunosuke with a gentle eye. After a few seconds of this, Ryuunosuke’s self-consciousness stepped in and made his neck and face burn bright red against the white of his shirt.
“Please stop staring,” he said weakly in admonishment, and Barok simply smiled and offered a quiet apology for being inappropriate. However, even when Barok turned his eyes to the beach instead, he can still sense that Barok was watching him out of the corner of his eye, as if rather reluctant to remove Ryuunosuke from his sight even for a second. Ryuunosuke wondered if he should think of it as either flattering (was he, Ryuunosuke, that interesting to capture Lord van Zieks’s attention so?) or insulting (was he, Barok, perhaps trying to look out for mishaps before they happen to Ryuunosuke?), before settling on a rather strange mixture of the two. He wasn’t really offended, though.
“So this is how English aristocrats spend their summers,” he finally said in way of small talk, and Barok turned his full attention back to him and inclined his head gravely. “What a curious experience. —Thank you for taking me here.”
The last sentence he spoke in a much more affectionate tone than he made sure to use in public, and Barok’s pale cheeks colored up a little at the obvious love in his voice.
“I want to see you happy,” was the simple answer.
Ryuunosuke graced him with a smile and a blush of his own, and raised the coffee cup to his lips once more, a little ploy to buy himself time. At this point, however, the server had thankfully reappeared with a slice of dacquoise on a plate, and Ryuunosuke gazed at the toothsome concoction of cashew nuts, layered meringue, and chocolate cream with awed eyes.
“It looks exactly like how I thought food in heaven would look like,” he said happily, and Barok suddenly looked as if he was fighting hard not to smile.
The weather persisted in its beauty when they finally paid the bill and started following the long walkway back to their hotel. Ryuunosuke kept stealing glances at Barok, who looked as cool as ever even in the brilliant summer heat, and privately thought that it must have been a one-in-a-million chance, this; that all of the elements of time and space would align to bring about this moment—
“Barok,” he finally murmured, and it was as if time stopped as Barok paused and looked at him curiously.
“Hm, you look serious all of a sudden. Should I be worried?”
Ryuunosuke chuckled, and then cast an eye over the throng of merrymakers passing them by, all of them thankfully giving the couple not one little glance of interest. The overwhelming sense that the love he was struggling to contain in his chest was hopelessly expanding and crushing his lungs was suddenly there, and he felt the temptation to put a hand over his heart to check if it was still fine, but such a poetic gesture might be misinterpreted by his too-serious companion.
“Well,” he finally continued, “I wonder if… if all the people around us can tell that you are mine, and mine alone.”
Barok seemed struck by this thought, and they dawdled a little on the spot. “Sometimes,” he murmured, and Ryuunosuke looked up at him with trusting round eyes, “I wish I could wear the ring on my finger and just… show it to the world.”
Ryuunosuke suddenly felt the weight of the chain around his neck that his ring was hanging from, and understood every word that his beloved… no, not just that, but his husband , his husband in all but the eyes of the law, the law that ironically they both upheld… he understood every word that his husband had just uttered.
“I wish I could hold your hand right now,” Ryuunosuke murmured back, and Barok smiled at this.
“That would… be nice,” he admitted, flushing once more, a pale English rose blooming red in the Mediterranean heat, and a lovestruck Ryuunosuke was so happy, and so sad at the same time, and he felt like he could just cry from either emotion.
From the balcony of their hotel room, they had a beautiful view of the night sky that evening; Barok put on a record on the gramophone, some kind of piano music that Ryuunosuke figured sounded exactly like how the moonlight looked on the tranquil waters of the Mediterranean right now. Ryuunosuke, unable to resist the pull of the evening, took his wineglass and stepped outside onto the balcony, his dark eyes glowing in the light of a million stars. After a while of just watching the sky and the sea, he felt arms wrap around him from behind, and he smiled and melted into the warmth of his husband’s body.
“What is that piece called?” Ryuunosuke murmured, and they both gently swayed on the spot in time to the music before Barok whispered from behind, “Debussy’s Arabesque No.1 ,” and the intimate feeling of his breath fanning across the back of Ryuunosuke’s neck made the latter blush a rather bright red.
“You are very bold tonight, my lord,” he said softly, and then he set down his wineglass and turned around in Barok’s embrace, his face still flushed from being intoxicated on the wine, the stars, and his husband’s warmth, before standing up on tiptoes, throwing his arms around Barok’s neck, and kissing him hungrily on the lips—
“You will be the death of me one day, darling,” Barok teased him when they finally broke apart. “—Though, I will be forever honored if your face is the last sight I ever see on this good earth.”
“Then,” Ryuunosuke replied, drawing away and tugging Barok’s necktie undone, “let us make the most of it, shall we, husband?”—
The rest of the evening was a pleasant blur; it wasn’t until Ryuunosuke woke the next morning and sighed into his velvet pillows pleasantly when he finally fully registered the delicious, empty ache of his entire body, and the quick disappointment that followed when he realized that Barok wasn’t in bed with him anymore. He opened his eyes a crack, half-apprehensive of the creamy yellow sunlight streaming through the windows and onto the floor, and then realized that Barok, dressed in a robe, was seated on the armchair and facing him, resting a sketchbook on his crossed legs. He looked a little sheepish when he realized that Ryuunosuke had woken up, which served to clue the latter in as to the subject of his current illustration.
“Good morning,” Ryuunosuke said, his voice rusty from sleep, and Barok allowed himself to smile gently before flipping the book closed and standing up.
“Good morning,” he replied, and when he walked over and kissed him on the forehead, a doting partner if there was ever one, Ryuunosuke briefly considered pulling him back into bed so that they could somehow resume their rigorous lovemaking of the night before, but the call of his hunger was stronger than the call of further pleasure, and Barok chuckled against the short, messy black hair when he heard the pitiful growl of Ryuunosuke’s tummy. “Let’s get something into you, alright?” was the afterthought, and pulled a nearby cart to the bed to uncover each and every gustatory delight.
True to Ryuunosuke’s aversion to rich food, Barok had chosen an earthy, robust meal of good bread and ham and eggs done in the delicate French style, some fresh radish salad on the side, and also a dish of brightly-colored macarons. Ryuunosuke feasted his eyes on each dish, pleasantly surprised, and took the coffee cup that Barok had handed him with a gracious word of thanks. The sharp tang of the beverage woke him fully, convincing him that he wasn’t sleeping any longer, and he finally dug in. Barok, who must have had his breakfast already, contented himself to just watch Ryuunosuke eat like a child, and it may have been a trick of the morning light, but his lip seemed to have curved up ever so slightly in an adoring smile.
“—I wish we can stay here in Nice longer.”
Ryuunosuke sighed this later on after breakfast, now fully dressed and draped across Barok’s lap as they sat on the armchair together and idly thumbed through the sketchbook, which sort of felt like Barok’s version of the travel journal that Ryuunosuke had been keeping. Some of the pictures inside were plain landscapes of the places that they’ve been to, but an embarrassingly large amount of them were just studies of Ryuunosuke—picture upon picture upon picture of Ryuunosuke smiling or sleeping or scratching his hair, and Ryuunosuke felt almost keenly in his heart how all of those Ryuunosukes on the pages of Barok’s sketchbook just radiated the calm love of the artist for his favorite subject.
“We have to catch the next train if we are to make it back to London in time,” Barok said apologetically, and Ryuunosuke sighed and tried to mask his sorrow by focusing at the drawings.
“Do you never get tired of looking at me?” he said wonderingly, his finger tracing the pencil strokes on the page, and Barok glanced at him, before following Ryuunosuke’s gaze to the most recent Ryuunosuke on the sketchbook: the him just a mere hour ago, still in the depths of heavenly slumber. Ryuunosuke blushed as he realized that even the love-bites on his neck and chest had been reproduced on paper with startling accuracy; he could feel Barok put his lips on his nape and smile at his reaction, the bastard.
“Watching you is like watching the ocean,” Barok answered, solemnly. “It changes so much so frequently, that one never gets tired of looking at it.”
Ryuunosuke glanced at Barok’s dancing eyes, their blue reminding him irresistibly of the violent, gentle blue of the sky outside their window, and wondered if he could be fully deserving of the honest adoration in those eyes—because it was as if Barok saw him as nothing short of beautiful—all the time—
“Is it not difficult, then,” he asked, haltingly, “to love the ocean, when it is gentle one second and turbulent the next?”
“Yes, it is difficult,” was the quiet reply. “But how can one prove to be worthy of the heart of the ocean if they not love the crashing waves as much as the startling depths of it?”
Again he felt that now-familiar sensation of wanting to shed tears due to the happiness and sadness swirling inside him.
From outside, Ryuunosuke thought he could hear the cry of a lone seagull.