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Melone holds his phone to his ear with a gloved hand that only barely trembles with anticipation and it feels like a victory already, that same addictive thrill that spikes through the very core of him and courses white-hot in his veins each and every time Baby Face returns to him undefeated and glorious.
But this? This was so much better.
Sprawled against the wall and the picture of rapidly fraying patience, Prosciutto sighs a weary throatful of smoke and cuts off his call to Melone’s phone after two measly rings and one millisecond of Melone greedily listening to him breathe down the line, trying but utterly failing to burst Melone’s smug bubble.
Even the clack of Prosciutto’s phone flipping shut manages to sound as long-suffering as the man himself, which is incredibly and annoyingly endearing. But sigh all he might, Melone is the victor here in this maddening, unspeakable little game of theirs and Prosciutto can’t even deny it.
That doesn’t mean Prosciutto won’t try though, so Melone cuts him off right back and gleefully twists the knife first before his dear old stickler can.
“Oh I just knew you’d ask for my number one day.” Melone coos with an obscene and still nowhere near appropriate amount of pleasure for this frankly monumental moment. “I told you, didn’t I?”
“Did you?” Prosciutto drawls like it hurts to live, but the fact he was still there and hadn’t stalked away to another damn province and as far away from Melone as possible says more than Prosciutto’s mean disdain ever could and oh it is too easy.
Melone knows damn well his mouth is stretched too sharp and too wide for a grin of polite or sane company as he helps himself to Prosciutto’s personal space and edges closer, planting a boot on either side of Prosciutto’s crossed legs. More an unsettling baring of teeth than anything and the same one he shares with Baby Face, no matter the mother.
One he knows Prosciutto begrudgingly likes as much as he loathes because Prosciutto is neither polite nor sane especially when it comes to Melone, no matter how hard he acts like he is. Melone’s face aches from the strain of it but it is so very worth the pain to piss Prosciutto off and rile him up. To have Prosciutto’s eyes on his mouth. To have Prosciutto’s eyes on him.
“Couldn’t resist my charm, could you?” Melone asks lowly, charmingly flicking Prosciutto’s ugly necklace and his hands shake a little harder when Prosciutto stands there and takes it, his touches and teasing. “I can’t blame you, obviously. You’re only human after all,” Melone slowly drags his eyes up every inch of Prosciutto, from the loafers on his feet to the impeccable suit embracing him like a flawless second skin to the neat spill of his golden hair, “under all that fancy, bespoke armour.”
Prosciutto’s jaw clenches tight as he grinds those sweetly overbitten teeth of his and forces himself not to react or rant and rave about professionalism and to meet Melone’s gaze instead of his cruel, taunting mouth. “Melone–”
“Which means I won!” Melone beams, clapping his hands together in delight. Loudly. “And Sorbet owes me fifty lira! And Ghiaccio. And Illuso and Formaggio. And–”
“You didn’t win shit,” Prosciutto insists hotly with a hand on his cocked hip like the scolding mother he was born to be in another universe because god forbid Melone have one up on him with something as trivial as this, colleagues-slash-something-more-that-neither-will-fully-acknowledge exchanging work numbers. “Capo ordered, I obeyed. It’s called respecting your fucking superiors and doing what you’re goddamn told. You should look it up.”
Melone hums and splays his hands on his own hips, spine arching to leer down in Prosciutto’s face. “Whatever helps you sleep at night with my number in your phone.”
“Fuck off.” Prosciutto grunts diplomatically and pointedly pockets said phone, smoothing his suit jacket out habitually, all prim and proper. It physically hurts Melone to keep his hands to himself for once. “It’s strictly professional, Melone. Work related contact only and because you need shit like this spelling out for you that means no crotch shots or worse. And no lewd texts.”
“Lewd texts!” Melone splutters an abrupt laugh right in Prosciutto’s unimpressed face. “You are one thousand years old. Thanks for killing the mood, nonno. Do you even know how to text? Or how to turn the thing on?”
Prosciutto stares at him flatly. “I know how to turn it on.”
Because Pesci taught me goes unspoken but is heard loud and clear by both of them regardless.
“You sure do.” Melone hums again, cocking his head as he looks Prosciutto up and down one more time with a coy slice of smile. “And that isn’t the only thing you turn on.”
Stupid joke and way too easy. Prosciutto was literally asking for it, even though it’s not a joke at all and the stone cold, rock hard truth.
Stupid, but worth it, because Prosciutto scoffs and turns away with a huff of idiot under his breath but not before Melone catches the small smirk on his handsome face under the glare of the fire exit sign above them. Prosciutto’s ears are red. He’s pleased. His turn to be smug. Happy. Because of Melone.
Something in Melone’s poor, cold dark chest seizes painfully tight. Feels like he’s dying a little bit, but in the good way. Melone wants, so badly it should scare both of them. Wants to taste that smirk, wants to cut his own mouth and lips and tongue on it and hold that handsome face between his undeserving hands and give Prosciutto even just an ounce of what Prosciutto himself makes Melone feel. Every time they’re in the same room or on opposite sides of the country, tangled in sheets or barely able to look at one another without tearing each other’s throats out, Melone wants it all. This unspeakable, wonderful, terrifying thing.
Melone does nothing, of course. He never has.
And he knows he never will. They’re already doomed before they can even start.
Baby Face never lies.
That smirk is gone as soon as it appeared when Prosciutto turns back to him, cigarette newly lit and hanging from the perpetual downturn of his mouth, severe face schooled back into default untouchable disdain. His ears are still red.
“Work. Related. Only.” Prosciutto repeats slowly, jabbing Melone in the chest with each stern word. “Exchanging numbers is for your benefit rather than mine anyway.”
Melone pulls a sympathetic and sarcastic face. “Did Riz tell you that?”
“No, capo did.” Prosciutto corrects.
“Riz’s word is law.” Melone nods in insolent agreement. “Obviously. And the Pope shits in the woods and all that.”
“Razor-thin ice, Melone.” Prosciutto warns, but as threats go it’s as weak as the ice Melone is on. He’s practically teasing, as good as bantering when his mouth twitches. “You’re too young to die but that won’t fucking stop me sucking you dry.” Flirting, even as the hulking shadow of The Grateful Dead flickers promisingly at Prosciutto’s side.
Melone grins wryly, delighted all over again. Prosciutto’s rare good moods were infectious and addictive and rare. It was easy to be infected by them, any of the squad would agree. Some of their most notorious nights out had been borne of this exact good mood after all and that was all the invitation Melone never needed.
He throws his leg over Prosciutto’s and throws himself against the wall too, slumping down it so they’re the same height for once and Melone gets comfy beside Prosciutto when he’s not shoved off. Nudges Prosciutto’s shoulder with own. Nudges his ribs with his elbow when Prosciutto ignores him and happily accepts the jab to his gut in return, but even that playful little love jab feels good.
It is too easy to be infected and swept up in that dangerous good mood of his.
“You never know–” Melone starts, his head on Prosciutto’s broad shoulder, and quickly stops. Voice dying in his mouth as soon as he opened it. Melone cringes internally. Embarrassing as fucking hell, choking up like a hopeless lovesick teen. He plucks the cigarette from Prosciutto’s lips while he tries and fails to pluck his fucking courage too, taking a long, slow and stalling drag of his own.
Prosciutto lets him. He always lets him. Always gives as Melone relentlessly takes. Those hard shards of ice in the sockets of Prosciutto’s skull drop to Melone’s lips wrapped around the cigarette and his hollowed cheeks before dragging back up to his eyes again and staying there. Eye contact is safe, for the most part. This game of cat and mouse is more like cat and stubborner cat and Melone aches for it and this stubborn, unbearable, maddening man, the Something of his life.
Not love. It can’t be. Can it? The not-love of his life. Yeah. No. Ugh.
“Never know what?” Prosciutto murmurs, head tilting to catch Melone’s eye in that relentless encouraging way of his, no matter how irritated he was with the recipient. Stupid. Maddening. Impossible man. Melone couldn’t stand him. He’d fucking die for him.
He shouldn’t say it.
It’s tempting fate, just begging for it. It’s tempting Prosciutto’s rare good mood and the unbearably high stakes of their thing, just begging to drive Prosciutto away for good and he can’t say it, he just can’t.
And then Prosciutto’s cheek rests carefully against Melone’s head. His nose is in Melone’s hair. Prosciutto breathes deep, once, and stays there. He holds Melone’s scent in, and Prosciutto’s exhale is shaky when he releases it.
“You might just need me some day.” Melone says it to the wall beyond them, because he’s a coward and can’t make himself meet Prosciutto’s bare honest gaze even as Melone is the one blatantly crossing some verbal, unspoken line here. The dangerous, sickening territory of raw vulnerability. “And if you do, if you call? I’ll be there.”
The space between them, the constant but barely there literal and figurative space is filled and thrumming with everything they never say and never will. In a way, they don’t even have to. They know, and they don’t. It’s the biggest bluff, the shittiest game. It’s not enough and too much but it’s them. It’s why they work and why they don’t. Compatibly incompatible.
Is this love? Melone’s not sure. He’s not sure he wants it either, but he has it. It’s his, as much as Prosciutto will never be.
Prosciutto heaves himself off the wall and from under Melone’s cheek and that’s that.
Game over. Not surprising, but still hurts. It’s fine. Melone expected it. To piss him off, run him off, ruin everything. It’s fine. That’s what Melone does. It’s Prosciutto. That’s just what they do.
What Melone does not expect is for Prosciutto to inescapably put himself directly in Melone’s blankly staring line of sight and stay there like he’s prepared to all damn night and like a fucking idiot Melone stands to attention the second he does, startling back to full height when his gaze snaps back into focus.
Prosciutto has to tilt his head back to meet Melone’s wide-eyed gaze but covers it as simply raising his chin. Always manages to look down on him even while Melone’s lanky ass looms over him. That shouldn’t be endearing either. Shouldn’t make Melone need to kiss him quite so starvingly. There was something seriously wrong with him. Melone seriously does not care.
The cigarette falls from his mouth when a hand darts up and grabs Melone’s face. Not hard or tight. Not threatening. Prosciutto doesn’t need any of that shit to hurt him anyway. Prosciutto could bleed him dry, desiccate him in seconds. It’d be so easy. A horrific, nightmarish way to die but the way Melone would choose to go if he could be so lucky.
Prosciutto just holds him, just looks, and Melone lets him. Pours over every inch of Melone’s face and the sudden desperately longing look on it and very mercifully doesn’t say anything about it. Spares Melone the mortification even though they both knew damn well Melone would never ever let Prosciutto live it down. Is that love?
“No fair.” Melone pants roughly, squeezing his thighs tight together and biting his lip, too gone just from Prosciutto’s look and his touch, his goddamn presence to even pout. “Low blow, you fucker. That’s just playing dirty.”
Prosciutto arched an amused brow. “And you don’t?”
“Uh,” Melone blinked dazedly, smile innocence incarnate. “No?”
“Liar.” Prosciutto muttered with a small smile of his own, dark and fond.
And Melone turned to unworthy putty in Prosciutto’s hold, any and all bravado melted into the waiting, greedy palm of Prosciutto’s hand. Melone shuddered, eyes fluttering shut, rolling into the back of his skull. Just a little longer like this, just a few more hours just like this, just the two of them, that wasn’t too much to ask.
Unfortunately, the universe could read his mind. Unfortunately, nothing good ever lasts.
Prosciutto squeezes his jaw, his cheeks, but softly, gently coaxing Melone’s eyes back open. The soft touch hurt as deeply as the very worst of their fights. It hurt so good. Was that love?
“The day I call you for help is the day I die.” Prosciutto promises Melone grimly, but not unkindly, and after one final lingering and brimming glance shared between them, he releases Melone and walks away without a backwards glance.
Melone watches Prosciutto go like he always will and unfortunately, he believes him.