Chapter Text
“Are you sure it’s okay to have me stay with you, bro?”
“Yes. Obviously,” he responds, unzips his bag, “My dorm mate didn’t want to stay with me anymore.”
“Why?” His brother asks, pushes his bag into the wardrobe, doesn’t unpack it—he’s not going to educate him on how bad that’s going to feel in the morning. Not his job. His brother can learn on his own.
“Called me a stuck up nasty bitch and said he never wanted to see me again,” he replies, neatly taking out his clothes and sorting them out onto the bed, outfits onto hangers, his brother will realise to do this someday, “Turns out, he’s pretty popular. Nobody actually wants—there’s like one person in this whole college interested in rooming with me and she doesn’t even go here, and her boyfriend would kill himself if they had to change rooms.”
“She doesn’t… go here? Then why does she stay here?” Right. Why does she stay here? What a good question his brother poses, he wishes he had a good response.
“Boyfriend,” it seems like the closest to the best explanation. She stays here with his boyfriend but he has checked the rules and that certainly shouldn’t be allowed—then again, he’s done plenty of things against the rules, in particular regarding the idiotic policy of no eating food outside the dorm or the dining room and no cooking, “If you see a guy with red glasses and matching red shoes, don’t talk to him. He’s a fucking asshole. And do not try to argue grammar with that guy—he can be wrong, but don’t argue about it. That’s his boyfriend.”
“Oooh. Okay. I can’t go—what’s his name?” How his brother immediately decides that he understands the fact there’s an extra person staying at their school, an annoying one at that, will remain a mystery.
“If you want his legal name, you’re going to have to figure that out on your own. I’ve had one course with the guy and even the teacher called him Ghiaccio. You know, ice? Because he’s such an icy bitch? Like not even my nickname is that direct,” he wonders where Melone gets hers. How someone with no chest to speak of gets named melon but the man with the biggest pair he’s ever seen gets Risotto? Unbelievable. Should switch.
“Oh… what was yours again? Prosciutto? Like… right I’ve been meaning to ask you this. Why ham?” His brother asks it innocently, he wants to fucking die—does everyone have to know every moment he’s had? Does his brother need to know about him embarrassing himself?
“I’ll tell you when you’re older.” No he does not. He does not need to know.
“Huh?!”
A knock sounds on the door, he stands, opens, almost smiles seeing them,
“Sorbet! Gelato! What are you doing here?”
“Sorbet heard your brother was coming and figured he could use company,” Gelato speaks in a voice Prosciutto would consider unnaturally even if he wasn’t used to listening to his own voice, and occasionally hearing other people’s voices, Ghia mostly, struggling to emote without screaming. Gelato doesn’t speak with a baseline annoyance, more a perfectly steady peace. It’s like listening to a video of a cult leader that had his people all killed—you hear how he could be convincing. You hear how he could have people hanging onto each word—he hears a reason for Sorbet to love him so dearly in each syllable.
“Oh! Nice to meet you?” His brother stands up, more stumbles, and extends an arm out to Sorbet. Prosciutto can’t decide if it’s funny how Sorbet’s eyes trail over the two of them while they shake hands, seeking a physical similarity, trying to comprehend his brother.
“Right. Are you like… full brothers?” Gelato asks, suddenly. Sorbet chokes, mumbled something about how he ‘can’t just ask that’ but turns to Prosciutto anyway.
“Half. My mum and dad were never actually together. Mum found his dad while pregnant with me and the rest of it is… history, I guess,” he feels odd, explaining family histories to people. Not like it should matter, they’re brothers anyway.
“Oooh. That makes sense—.”
“If you’re wondering why I look like this, you know you can just ask, right?” Prosciutto’s brother isn’t confrontational, a fish out of water begging to be released into the water on his best days—kind and sweet—, so the question doesn’t sound mean, it doesn’t even sound angry—but he can tell. He can’t tell anyone else’s ulterior motives, he can definitely tell his brothers. He’s agitated by the indirectness.
His brother has grown up with doubled looks and hushed whispers. Prosciutto remembers his brother getting bullied on the very first day of school for his face, the way his body contorts, as if that was his choice—he doesn’t think he looks that bad most of the time. His mother, and every stranger, is overreacting.
“None of my business,” Gelato replies, fairly quickly, lifts his hands up in surrender—Sorbet looks longingly at a wall, perhaps wanting to disappear, perhaps gathering the courage to ask if it’s an inherited look or perhaps his brother is an outlier. Prosciutto doesn’t much like that look but he knows the curiosity to be genuine, not out of prejudice but out of Sorbet’s pure fascination.
Sorbet has loved uglier things. Sorbet has loved a lot of uglier cats for example. Sorbet really loves ugly things, street cats to rats in oil traps, Sorbet finds a genuine affection for the disgusting. He’ll place a spider onto his hand and let it run up his body and then leave whenever it wishes. Sorbet, if anyone, is definitely not saying anything judgementally—Sorbet probably finds it co—
“You look cool.”
Cool. Yeah. Sorbet finds it cool.
“Oh… thaaanks?” His brother sounds unsure. Prosciutto gives his brother a thumbs up, communicates the genuine nature of Sorbet in the only way he can.
“So. What are you studying?” Gelato asks, to get away from this conversation mostly. Prosciutto could kiss the ground he stands on, this getting awkward the first day would make him suicidal.
“Uh… animation?” His brother sounds unsure, afraid, and he nods mostly to show that he’s there for him.
“Oh! You might show up on—you have your schedule, right?” Sorbet asks, something between excited and neutral—Sorbet doesn't emote much either. His face looks older when he smiles. Sorbet’s already not aging well, he does not need smile lines.
“Oh! I have this one! You can sit with me, if you want,” Gelato points, a smile playing on his lips, “I actually haven’t had anyone in a while. Me and Illuso had a couple photography courses together a while ago but he’s got all her sewing classes pushed up together so we aren’t seeing each other until like… January.”
“I wish I could get rid of Illuso,” Prosciutto sighs, annoyed, “He keeps—why is he in my 3D art classes? Why would he need to know how to make 3D art? Just let him suffer with a flat figure.”
“At least you’re not me. I love Melone, my favourite daughter, love her dearly,” Sorbet takes a deep breath, “What he sees in Ghiaccio is beyond me. He’s.. like he’s in almost all my writing classes, Formaggio is in almost all of my directing related classes, I know no peace. It’s either Ghiaccio loud or Formaggio loud all day every class.”
“You have your last with me three days a week,” Gelato says, pointing at something on the schedule—Prosciutto doesn’t have to care. Gelato shows up in some of his classes, Illuso in others, Risotto in not enough for him to finally get the courage to ask him to hang out. Risotto comes to hangout when Sorbet chooses that he needs to do charity and invite an emo, Ghiaccio comes when Melone is involved, Formaggio and Illuso drag each other down long halls to go make ‘sweet love’ under stairs (he’s 99% convinced Illuso says ‘sweet love’ just so they don’t intrude on their time. They wouldn’t. Melone might intrude on their time otherwise.) but also drag each other to group meetings.
“A-Are you all food other than Illuso? How did that happen?” His brother asks, finally, confused. Gelato laughs, rather loudly, and nods—it’s not genuine. Gelato doesn’t get that loud much. He screams when he’s angry, he doesn’t do being loud otherwise.
“Yeah. Most of us. Sorbet got his because the bitch of a teacher really mispronounced his name and he couldn’t bother correcting her. I got mine pretty soon after. It was originally going to be Fagioli but someone thought ‘Yo what if we didn’t call this guy an actual homophobic slur’. Cowards.” The amusement comes back in his tone fairly quickly but there’s a true annoyance buried beneath his carefree tone—not at the slur, more at the lack of respect for his boyfriend—Prosciutto wonders if perhaps Gelato talks for Sorbet sometimes. He images the taller, not significantly but still taller, man with an unfortunate hairline hiding behind his boyfriend like a child in a line at McDonalds. He has to stop himself from laughing.
“You… want to be called a slur?” His brother is infinitely more confused now. Prosciutto really wonders if perhaps he’s autistic.
“Yes. Obviously. Brings me joy and entertainment. I love being called slurs in the morning. It’s like breakfast. Anyway it became Gelato from Gel because Sorbet called me something that sounds like Gel and now it’s stuck and nobody remembers what my name—Yes Sorbet I know you do, no need to tell me. Love you.”
“…Right. And why Formaggio?”
“He smells like it,” Sorbet mumbles, laughs, “I mean. He does. Still. Used to be way worse. You could tell that man was coming from smell more than his fucking voice and he can get loud. I don’t actually know the Illuso origin, I assume he did like a magic trick or something.”
“Nah. After a big exam, our class went to a carnival and… some of us… consumed certain substances. Illuso got high, started getting confused by mirrors and started poking at them saying they weren’t the real Illuso, that they were illusions. We thought it was so funny we gaslit him into thinking he was the illusion instead the whole way back to school,” Gelato explains, laughing as he says it. He laughs a lot as of late, maybe because he gets to be by his boyfriend again—the summer had clearly been agonising, with Sorbet back home and Gelato left all on his own in Italy.
“Heyyy Prosciuttooo~.”
“Oh God fucking dammit,” Gelato mumbles, turns his head. Sorbet looks delighted.
There she stands with her bag over her shoulder, holding her ancient little laptop. She has a grin on her face, head tilted to the side with an obvious attempt to seem approachable. She’s come to ask for something, Prosciutto can tell from everything. Her singing tone, her posture, her hands behind her back—she’s far too animated for him when she tries to be manipulative. When she’s normal, he quite likes her sometimes. He almost enjoys her company when he’s happy and she’s on adderall.
“So. Ghia kicked me out,” she says, matter of fact. He’s tempted to tell her to go home but he doesn’t actually know the home situation, if she can go home—he’s pretty sure they can’t. Melone wouldn’t hang around so much, especially with his boyfriend, through every argument, if they had a home to fall back on. He’s convinced of it.
“Need me to talk to him?” Sorbet asks. Prosciutto hopes Melone asks to stay with them instead of him—Gelato would rant all night in his dms but at least it would be better than sleeping near the most annoying person he knows.
“Nah. I’m just going to stay elsewhere until he remembers how bad he needs me and asks for me to come back. I can’t be the desperate one, especially when I’m not in the wrong here.”
Prosciutto cannot comprehend their relationship one bit. Ghiaccio seems downright upset with Melone half the time, Melone seems like he encourages Ghiaccio’s annoyance, intentionally gives him reasons to be mad at her, and then they’re fine and in love soon after. Melone seems to find Ghiaccio’s anger funny, if anything. Prosciutto is not sure if that’s healthy or not.
“Well I asked Risotto and he stared at me. Like really just… stared me down. Said if nobody else agreed, I can stay, but he’d make sure I asked everyone else. I went to Formaggio and Illuso but… I’m not clean, right? But Illuso already has designs and pins all on the floor and we’ve just gotten back! Formaggio was like ‘Have you taken your meds today?’ so they’re probably going to be smoking and you know I can’t be around that when I’m medicated. I couldn’t stay even if it wasn’t messy! So then I checked a couple other friends but they all said no, Sorbet and Gelato weren’t at their dorm so I came here—Oh. Who’s this?”
“This is my brother,” Prosciutto explains, pats his brother on the back—they may not have a great relationship typically but it’s a first day and Melone is intensely difficult even for people less sheltered.
“Oooh. He looks funky. I like the hair it looks like a fin. I’m actually going to do a project on fish soon. Well… kind of. You know what campylobacter is? I’m doing my project on that. DNA and Genealogy actually means you have to take other courses too, so sad. I can’t just read a bunch about different inherited diseases and how they ruin you and then ask Ghia, if he wants to get diagnosed with them because I see the signs.”
“That’s mean… isn’t he really bad with diseases?” Gelato asks. One would think he would sound concerned. Gelato sounds delighted. Much like most stereotypical gay men, Gelato enjoys misery and suffering. Or it might be vampires. If it’s stereotypes about vampires or gay men, Prosciutto and him definitely fit said stereotype to a T.
“Yeah but he loves me,” Melone says, confidently, with a smile, “I’m allowed to be funny to him about it. We both have the same exact fears for the same reason when it comes to diseases.”
“What fears?”
“Neither of us know our dads—no we don’t think we’re fucking related Gelato you will not reference those two gay guys who found out they’re brothers. My dads not Chinese. I am not Chinese. So we’re like huh.. we could get a serious chronic disease at any moment or pass one onto children, if we ever have any. Anyway. I can stay here or no?”
“Absolutely not,” Prosciutto says, tonally as still as ever, “I am not having Ghiaccio know you slept here without him. He might think I’m trying to get with you or something.”
“Are you?”
“Not his type. Too short, too feminine, you know. Gay,” his brother speaks and Melone, the asshole, laughs. He laughs. Prosciutto could kill himself.
“I can be a guy, if the guy’s cute enough. I don’t do the gender thing. I can be real masculine too. But yeah, no, Prosciutto is too… old. Emotionally. Old man. Retirement age. Anyway, Sorbet, can I stay—?”
“Sorbet if you let anyone else sleep in our dorm when I haven’t seen you in almost two fucking months I’ll go keep Ghiaccio company and stay there until you’ve made it up to me. Do you understand?”
“Yessir. Sorry, Melone,” Sorbet responds, sheepish, but the way he looks at Gelato honestly gives Prosciutto the thought that, again, Gelato is speaking for the both of them. Sorbet doesn’t want to be the bad guy but he wants to spend time with his boyfriend one on one too. It makes perfect sense to Prosciutto.
It also makes perfect sense to Melone because he just nods, with a nice little smile on his face again. Melone, for all his faults, isn’t nearly as disgusting looking as his boyfriend. He reminds Prosciutto of old movies, specifically the hookers in clubs trying to seduce the main hero for the main villain to be able to ambush him that sometimes got shot after falling in love with the leading man. He’s not the kind of attractive Prosciutto likes, which is far heavier on the ideas of largeness and vaguely gloomy poetic violence. Prosciutto enjoys people who have a completely unique way of showing affection, as he does. People who don’t expect kissing, hugging, whatever people do in relationships. He hates touching in those ways most of the time but he does enjoy being touched. There’s no man for him, he has figured that much out over the years.
“So, little Pesci. Little fish,” Melone starts, repeats it and Prosciutto just knows from the moment he says it. Pesci. Pesci is going to be his brothers weird borderline hazing nickname, “You’re new here right? Do you want to come eat with me?”
“Don’t make him eat cafeteria food first night,” a voice calls from the doorway, steps its way inside and by the vague scent of weed and cheese, Formaggio has entered their conversation. This means that someone will enter in three two on—
“We should go out. All of us.” Illuso, following behind his situationship. Prosciutto thinks that’s the description they gave for it.
He does not understand the concept. Prosciutto thinks that perhaps he may be autistic, well he is, but maybe it’s his autism not liking all these new labels for things. You’re kissing, you’re dating. You’re going out, you’re dating. You live together and are romantic, you’re definitely dating. You file taxes as a couple, you are most definitely dating. What the fuck about this situation is, well, a situation? What is unclear? He might tear his hair out.
“I could invite Risotto. But also wouldn’t Ghiaccio feel left out?” Sorbet explains and Prosciutto has to resist a, not so feminine, urge to scream with joy. Nobody’s ever seen a grown man scream with joy. He will not be the first one they see but also please please please please ple—
“I’ll invite him!” Melone exclaims, already on his phone, “He’s probably calm by now. Just say its friendly—he might actually apologise to me.”
“Ghia? Apologise? Oh honey…” Gelato has that same monotone tone as always but he certainly sounds like he may care a tiny little bit. Perhaps. Maybe just the slightest bit.
“He apologises to me. All the time. You guys just don’t get apologised to because he doesn’t care if you’re—well he wants to pretend he doesn’t care. You know how he is. Reeal tough guy. For a little pocket sized man, he sure fits a lot of anger and hatred inside him.”
“I think it’s because he’s pocket sized. The smaller the man, the more hatred and lack of whimsy fits inside. It’s why Risotto is like… emotionless. He can’t even have hatred,” Sorbet says it with confidence but Prosciutto is convinced he’s seen him emote. In more senses than just smiling—he’s never seen him smile. But he’s seen him twitch and he’s seen him breathe in with annoyance, he’s seen him hold in a laugh and suck in his face to not start cackling. He definitely emotes. And Prosciutto is definitely looking at people way too long to recognise this shit.
“God. His boobs probably—not appropriate actually.”
“Oh nono, Illuso, please do finish that. I probably agree with it,” Melone giggles. What a weirdo. Who giggles. That’s weird. He may be a judgemental person but at least it’s for a reason—giggling.
“His boobs probably ate all his emotions. It’s how they got so big. They absorbed everything inside his hard stone heart and left nothing behind—like that one. What the fuck is the name of that play? Formaggio?” Illuso clicks his fingers in an attempt to remember her thoughts—Gelato quietly shows the sign for Sorbet to shut the fuck up when he goes in to answer.
“…I… why am I supposed to remember everything here? Remember it on your own,” Formaggio shrugs and God is it like… smoking? Has smoking ruined both of these guys?
“Snow queen?” Pesci—god that name really fits fuck—asks, confused, “It’s not stone. The heart is like… ice?”
“Close enough! Are we going out to eat? Because if we do, I veto whatever Melone suggests,” Illuso has this evil glint in his eyes sometimes, mostly when bullying people, and it grows ever more apparent as Melone makes an appalled sound.
“I have great taste! Fuck you! I got Ghiaccio to stop eating the same shit every time—You can only watch a man order from the kids menu to get chicken tenders so many times before you grab his hands and ask if he’s severely autistic. I feel like if I got him to use the adult menu sometimes, not always, he doesn’t always, he’s allowed his chicken tenders—My taste has to be fucking fantastic.”
“I don’t care how fantastic your taste is, I hate your taste in everything else. I hate your taste in food simply on principle. I hate your taste in music, I hate your taste in games, I hate—“
“Calm down, Kendrick Lamar.” Formaggio interrupts. Illuso laughs—they have to be in love. If someone interrupts Prosciutto, he doesn’t laugh, he wants to roast that person on open fire and ideally show their decapitated head to their mother then cannibalise it as she cries—or just be angry. One of the two!
“I have to feed the cats, if we’re going out. I’ll go anywhere,” Sorbet explains—Prosciutto can tell it’s that he does not like being in such a tiny room with this many people. He’s claustrophobic for some reason. Almost like he fears being shoved in a box, or multiple boxes, and killed. It certainly makes sense to Prosciutto, he doesn’t like closed spaces either. It’s a part of why he hates trains.
“Tell Risotto to come with us!” Gelato yells after him, “And please tell the cats dad loves them very much and kiss their little heads and please give them the good brand this time and you know while you’re there, you could certainly empty the litter box!”
“I don’t think he heard half of that,” Formaggio observes. Wow! How intelligent! Formaggio certainly is one of these wise guys—Prosciutto likes him a lot. He’s probably near his favourite after Gelato himself.
“Ghia’s coming!” Melone announces. Nobody seems quite as happy as she is—not that they don’t like him but… well… being around both Melone and Ghiaccio post argument is perhaps the fate Prosciutto expects in Hell. When he goes to Hell for being a filthy gay, Prosciutto expects his eternal punishment to be hanging out with just Ghiaccio and Melone after they argued over something stupid nobody else would care at all about. The idea of listening to Ghiaccio heatedly yell about Melone’s incorrect linguistic choices or Melone’s passive aggressive attitude about Ghiaccio’s tendency to explain things Melone understands as if he didn’t—mansplain, for a shorter turn of phrase. Prosciutto knows it isn’t intentional, Melone knows it isn’t intentional, but Melone also gets a complex about being viewed as moronic from somewhere.
“So are you two good now?” Pesci, sweet, innocent, Pesci inquires with his typical ‘I’m sure I’m not going to get a lecture or anything’ tone of voice. The ‘I don’t know the trap I will walk into’ tone.
“What? No! Of course not! We’ll be sitting on opposite sides and not talking to each other until he apologises to me. He’s just not going to be left alone, if Risotto is also coming. Anyway, we going Chinese or does mr. Kendrick Lamar want to suggest something instead of being a veto machine?”
“Nah. Just not Chinese.”
“I’m going to fucking punch you where it fucking hurts I will end your bloodline right here you fucking bitch,” Melone speaks. Even as usual. Melone doesn't really have an angry voice at the end of the day, nor is he angry—she certainly sounds different, less monotone, but she always speaks in tones that aren’t too overwhelming. Prosciutto wonders, sometimes, if he’s always been that way or if she changed the way she speaks to make communication with Ghiaccio easier.
Prosciutto doesn’t actually know when those two got together, probably sometime in high school. They’ve been together longer than Prosciutto has known them, longer than they’ve been at this school and certainly longer than Melone has had his current Twitter account. The previous one apparently got banned so he cannot check the dates for a possible boyfriend there. Nonetheless, a long time. Prosciutto can definitely comprehend the possibility that the versions he’s met of the two of them are more each others than they used to be, shaped by their relationship to each other.
“I would say Italian but I feel like who actually wants to get Italian food when they’re Italian—I know Ghia does. Ghia doesn’t count. Ghia isn’t real.”
“He’s an illusion.” Gelato announces, shrugging, “Also, honestly, let Pesci pick. He’s the new kid. If Melone can get Ghia to eat anywhere, I’m sure Pesci can choose something he likes near enough.
“Oh my god slay. Me too. Illusion twins.”
“I like the idea of letting Pesci pick!” Melone exclaims. This is what he means with the not monotone. He’s certainly capable of getting loud and high—she’s like a choir singer in that sense. And also in the sense she absolutely belts off key in cars. Horrible times. Ghia and Melone deserve each other for being the most obnoxious people.
“Uhh… fuck,” Pesci says, ever intelligent. He takes out his phone, painstakingly types in restaurants near me onto maps, presses down and waits the time dictated by the shitty WiFi of a university dormitory without an elevator. That being, an incredibly not well off at the end of the day one, “Could do KFC.”
“Sure. I’m pretty sure they have vegetarian shit,” Melone hesitates. Prosciutto has to think—Melone’s fucking vegetarian? What the fuck? Since when? Has he always been vegetarian? Has he forgotten? Is that why he’s called Melone? Was he just really down for some watermelon?
“Oh and they have chicken for your boyfriend too, Melone!” Illuso deduces. Perfect for each other. Formaggio and Illuso both act like they must scream out the most basic forms of deduction. It’s like how him and Gelato are a match made in heaven in all but taste in men—they’re bitchy. Gelato is eyeing him to say that he’s also judging the only people that will tolerate them. They’re bitchy vampires, gay people, same thing.
“KFC also. Yeah I think Risotto eats… I’ll have to ask Sorbet but I think Risotto eats chicken.”
“Does he not eat meat?” Prosciutto asks, suddenly interested. Gelato looks at him with the exact level of judgement he expected from Gelato when he sounded even slightly interested in something—Gelato judges interest as if he didn’t tell him how much he missed his boyfriend mid overwatch game last night. Gelato judges as if they hadn’t lost their game because he ranted about how badly he wanted to go with and meet Sorbets extended family and have 17 babies or something. Prosciutto was honestly not listening that hard.
“He.. he’s picky. Sorbet says it’s why he ate straight risotto a whole year. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, every day. Seven days a week. Apparently he refused to eat if risotto was not available to the point Sorbet started to make it for him. It’s where the name came from. But I think Risotto’s over it. Hopefully. I cannot take the scent of rice in my house—dorm—whatever.”
“I could make it for him, if he needs.”
“Okay, sure, mr. Housewife,” Illuso interrupts and honestly who is he to be a part of him and Gelato’s conversation that they started right in front of him? Who is she to interrupt them? This was very private thank you very much.
“Ugh. Just tell Ghiaccio to come here, Mel—are you texting him?” Prosciutto asks, watches Melone shake his head no and quickly switch DMs. Right. He’s not going to question that he’s not nosy but if someone could be he would definitely not listen in on the answer—
“Who you texting?” Oh Illuso is a beautiful man.
“Kid at my college. I give him help on like how to deal with people socially. Smarter than me otherwise. He really needs someone to help. He's actually awful at this kind of shit. Like even for his age. And now he has to be around actual adults with these social skills?”
“How… old is this kid?” Gelato asks, conflicted, “Like what? 16? He can’t be that bad I was around mostly adults at 16 and I turned out fine. Other than little siblings obviously.”
“Oh yeah he’s 13.”
“He’s what now?” Prosciutto has to look around for reactions. Formaggio looks unbothered but it’s hard to make Formaggio look bothered about anything, he’s seen him just stare down the worst possible scenarios with a sort of empty amusement. Illuso looks bothered. Not as much as the rest of them but he at least seems to understand how completely awful that is. Gelato looks horrified.
“Oh what a poor thing!” God he really wants to judge Gelato for giving a fuck but he’s also quite shocked. A little jealous but shocked mostly.
“Yeah. Good kid, I like him. Law school’s right by mine so I saw him walking to class one time and noticed some people being assholes. Which, how miserable do you have to be to bully a child? I hope their mums turn lesbian and their dads kill themselves, anyway, so I go up and I’m like ‘yo quit it’ and they fuck off and I walk the kid to class and he does not appreciate it at all but I figure I should do it more so he’s not feeling like unsafe and now I’ve got his number and he texts me about things people say to him so we can analyse the meaning behind their words for him.”
Prosciutto can’t tell if the fact ‘yo quit it’ is said in a far deeper voice tells him something about how Melone views herself or not. He certainly knows he hears the high notes in his voice far easier than anyone else does—he hears the way he speaks, he hears the tendency to not demand space but to give it away instead, stop yelling when someone yells louder. He wonders if it’s also somewhat of a dysphoric thing, or if Melone just likes to make himself in her stories sound more gruff and manly for some kind of appeal from them. He cannot understand it, he’ll have to read about it later in those psychology textbooks he’s thought about borrowing from the library again for a reread.
“I would’ve actually killed myself, if I had to go to university that young. Like 16 seems fine,” Formaggio shrugs, still unbothered while speaking about this, “I mean come on. It’s easy now but that’s because I’m an adult and can drink it out if I really make a fool of myself.”
“He doesn’t really make a fool of himself outside yelling. He yells a good bit. Gets angry a lot. He’s yelled at me a couple times, it’s not that scary. It’s more sad.”
“Are you talking about Pannacotta?” Ghiaccio asks, from the doorway—Melone huffs, crosses his arms, pretends he didn’t hear—childish, really.
“I love him I’ll gladly adopt him, if his parents tire of him. I’ve been meaning to ask if he has any friends. Maybe, if he does, he and I could figure out a way for him to find this advise from them. If not, I might bring him along here sometimes.”
“Bring him over so we can have full teams on overwatch. Risotto, you, your child, Prosciutto and Pesci versus me, Ghia, Formaggio, Sorbet and Gelato.”
“He doesn’t play video games. Pretty much only studies and sleeps. If he keeps going like this, he’ll graduate early from law school. He might even be like 16 and already have a degree. Like a masters. Maybe a doctorate at 18. There’s no way other than up for him right now and that’s scary. The day everyone else catches up to him, he’ll probably be very upset about losing all those experiences just for shit he could’ve reached anyway, just later.”
“Is this a personal—are you projecting?”
“A little.”
“He reminds me a little bit of me too,” Ghiaccio explains, he forgot he was here just now. He has yet to contribute all that much, “Whole no social interaction with anyone his age most of the time thing, I mean.”
Melone pretends he hasn’t heard his speak, something he does fairly often, perhaps all the time, when he’s upset. He ignores the topic completely majority of the time, jumps to another one with tact only he could manage. Melone is a fantastic example of someone who doesn’t have the skills to say that he’s just upset and noo Prosciutto definitely doesn’t relate what.
“Risotto’s coming,” Sorbet drags a far taller, far more gloomy looking man behind himself.
Risotto stands in front of his dorm room, hands dry with tiny bits of paint and little cuts, barely healed, across the bed of his palm. Risotto is too large to get inside through the door without bending his knees, something Illuso finds delightful to call ‘grandma knees’ as soon as Risotto huddles his way in. He has wide shoulders, they almost struggle with the abnormally thin door frame and Prosciutto, if he did not know Risotto as well as he does, would compare it to a wild fox attempting to intrude into a rabbits den.
“Oh! I did not expect mr. Emo,” Illuso quips, “To be okay with KFC.”
“I… wouldn’t call him emo, it's more of a… goth vibe? If anything?”
“You love me and agree with me, Maggot, emo.”
“…Fine okay yeah emo.”
Right. Situationship. Prosciutto might murder both of them and their families violently. What kind of situationship involves being close enough to love each other?
“If anyone’s emo, it’s you, Illuso,” Prosciutto quips. He does not mean this, he finds it fun to frustrate everyone around him. As he said, gay or vampire. One of the two.
“I am not!” Illuso looks awfully offended for someone wearing black and white right now.
“If it’s anything it’s probably post punk. But also punk isn’t really about the aesthetic. It’s just that there’s a certain punk aspect to pins and things like that, especially when it comes to the concept of punk fashion. Alternative—pan alternative.” He has to stop and turn his head because since when did his brother know anything about fashion. And why does he look correct, based on Illuso’s delight and Risottos slight posture change?
“I judged you too early, Pesci! You and I might actually be great friends!” Illuso gets too excited for a man that probably cries over cat videos online. Gelato and him share a long look from across the room—they will be talking about this later. They will be judging people for emoting later. They are sort of like the gates of heaven, judging every sin, also known as everything they found cringy, and deciding if they can be forgiven. Judge, jury and executioner.
“It’s not a choice. If a normal jacket fit, I would probably wear it,” Risotto finally speaks. He cannot show any delight about this or Gelato might tell Sorbet that he likes him and Sorbet will arrange a double date and it’ll be awkward because Sorbet and Gelato will be on top of each other kissing half of it. Worst case scenario. He’d almost rather go on a date with Ghia and Melone instead. Ghia at least hates public displays of affection almost as much as he hates people using the wrong you’re in English. Formaggio and Illuso, he would take any day. Overly affectionate but Illuso has self respect and Formaggio has manners so it wouldn’t be as bad. Illuso is argumentative, Formaggio backs him up, but Prosciutto knows how to leave an argument without losing, Risotto knows how to become invisible in social situations and won’t be arguing in the first place. Also, Prosciutto knows exactly what care home Formaggio’s father stays in. He does not have something as big to make Gelato behave as marching up to his sickly father, who he actually loves, and telling him that his son is a stoner. Not when he specifically doesn’t want Sorbet to get the idea to help him. He’s stuck between a rock and a hard place.
“You know how a normal jacket could fit?”
“No. Illuso, I’ve told you no. It’s not going to change.”
The bastard fake cries. It’s so terribly fake sounding that it’s definitely a joke, but Gelato still stares him down and whips out his phone in the moment, which means this is an immediate thing to judge someone for. It’s an emergency hearing.
‘God. Imagine actually being like that.’
Prosciutto holds in a laugh with a cough, looks at Gelato, waits for him to continue.
‘These bitches are having so much audacity these days. I’ve been staring at him all day. And just thinking. Do we need to put you in kindergarten again the way you don’t know how to be normal?’
Prosciutto knows it’s not particularly genuine, they both very much like Illuso—Illuso is as close as they get to a third in their little duo. If he had to believe in soul siblings, Illuso would be an annoying soul half brother that steals your space and makes you hate being alive but you love anyway. Gelato and him, their souls are twins. They’re two halves of the same coin, the coin being blond twinks with a taste for far more quiet men… and also probably being too mean for their own good. They’ve both made multiple children cry, which probably means they should relax a little bit.
Gelato and Sorbet got married a while ago—young and in love, as Illuso had said. Honestly, Prosciutto thinks they got married just so Gelato didn’t have to change his name twice. He was going to change his first name, why not last simultaneously? It’s an act of pure dislike for the legal system and how much effort changing your name takes. If he hadn’t already changed his name, much to his mothers agonised cries, he would change it when he got married too. He’d ask Risotto to get married for tax related reasons.
“We should probably drive. Melone, are you taking Ghiaccio or is he coming in the car with us?” Sorbet asks, looking down at the maps, “Risotto. If you leave now, you might only be five minutes late.”
“Thanks. I’ll see you there,” Risotto responds, turns around to leave.
Prosciutto debates for a long second, grabs his coat and starts putting it on before he’s thinking too hard, “I’ll walk too. I don’t wanna sit in between people again.”
Assuming Sorbet drives, Gelato sits next to him, Melone goes on his own, he’ll be seated with Pesci and Ghiaccio in the backseat. This is a fate worse than death because Pesci will try to talk to him and Ghiaccio will be yelling to the front seat and it’s only slightly better than sitting in Illuso’s shitty old ride while Formaggio sits upfront and talks to Illuso so loudly and so lovingly, or their version of loving, which is a lot of jokes he doesn’t want to hear, he wants to throw up. This is only tolerable in the situation where Risotto is in the car with him or he’s sitting in the back with Gelato. Neither will be happening.
“We could put down the back, sit Formaggio and Illuso in the trunk. No need for you guys to drive.” Also meaning Gelato is worrying they will crash if they’ve been smoking. Risotto looks roughly as concerned, if not more. He’s never been told why, but he seems to hate cars anyway.
“Oh! Sounds good,” Illuso says, devilish. That’s enough to know even if Prosciutto wasn’t awkwardly seated in the middle seat because he’s the most bony out of everyone, excluding Ghia who is too autistic to have both his shoulders rubbing against someone else’s since he can hardly handle one shoulder, he would despise the ride the whole way through.
“Right. We’ll see you there, Melone. Please drive more carefully this ti—.”
“That was not my fault! He wasn’t watching where he was going—I got out the way! If anything, I drove way too carefully. At least if I’d died on his fucking window, he would know not to speed!”
Risotto is gone before Melone can finish the last sentence. He’s quick to jog after.
“Are you okay?” He asks, almost grabs Risotto by the shoulder but stops himself. He wouldn’t like some twink that wants to be way too up in his space to touch him, if he was upset.
There’s a deep breath. It’s not quite cold enough to fog up but it feels like January lake water, drenches him in a feeling of anxiety he didn’t know he was capable of—Prosciutto doesn’t really feel, he judges people who do, he even judges Gelato for feeling so damn much every time an elderly cat they host in their house dies. You should get used to it eventually. Everything dies. He doesn’t mean that, he’s making a point. Maybe he does? Maybe it’s why he doesn’t attach himself.
“I’m fine. Just needed to leave so I’d get there in time,” Risotto speaks it into existence and it sounds off as soon as he does. Prosciutto finds his mouth isn’t very suited for syllables made up of lies—he chokes them out like poison.
“You… if you don’t want to say whatever it makes you feel, say you don’t want to talk about it. I can respect that, you don’t have to lie to me.”
“And if I want to talk about it? Isn’t it better for me to say it’s nothing than to fail when I try to talk about it?”
He feels breathless on some level. Because yeah, in his opinion, that’s definitely a valid point. If he thinks he can’t get it out correctly, he won’t talk about it either. But sometimes those are things he wants to talk about.
“Are you scared of cars?” He feels almost intelligent picking up on it. It would make sense.
“Not cars. Crashing, drunk drivers, my friends crashing, my cousins crashing, getting run over, my friends getting run over, my cousins getting run over—you get the point.”
“Oh. Well… that makes sense?” Prosciutto tries. He’s not very comforting, especially when the fear is logical. People like Illuso are bound to crash eventually. Melone already almost got crashed into once and he’s had a license maybe half a year.
“I know it does. I’m not trying to get over it.”
It’s so matter-of-fact he falls silent. Right. There’s nothing to really say about that. How does he talk about that? ‘Oh real anyway, wanna go make out real quick?’ No. This is definitely not something he knows how to do. He doesn’t know how to comfort people—but he knows to not tell Gelato. If Risotto wanted Gelato to know, Gelato would know, and would’ve told him all he needs to know.
“Did something happen?”
“Cousin. Couple years ago. I saw it happen,” his tone doesn’t waver. It gives Prosciutto hope that he’s not broken to struggle to feel when clearly Risotto struggles too. He wouldn’t be broken, if Risotto shares the trait. Risotto isn’t broken. He could never even entertain the thought.
“Oh… did they… catch the guy?”
“Did they? If they did, I don’t think he got punished nearly hard enough. If it had been up to me, he should get—Nevermind.”
“Death penalty?”
“Something like that. It wasn’t an accident he couldn’t have stopped. If he hadn’t… everything about it.”
Prosciutto gets the feeling Risotto isn’t honest about what actually happened. Or maybe he hasn’t asked clearly enough what happened exactly—but he also doesn’t want to bring up any bad memories making him recount anything.
“If it had been like an accident or like a stroke or something, I could’ve said—I could’ve gotten over it. But it’s the choice. He chose to do that. Even if he didn’t mean to, he chose to do it. He could’ve not drank. He could’ve not gotten behind the wheel. He could’ve not driven down a street with a lot of children. He could’ve rescheduled whatever he was going to. He had a choice, constantly, and he deliberately killed my cousin.”
“I hope he kills himself—sorry I! I’m sorry I didn’t mean to,” oh good job Prosciutto bringing up death to this guy after he talks about his trauma good job. Oh good God he hates everything about himself right about now.
“I do too. I hope they catch him on something worse. Not like killing people but like… espionage? and kill him. Execute him. I hoped he’d get into a fight in jail and they’d leave his pathetic ass to bleed out.”
“He’s out?” His shock almost breaks through the monotone nature of his voice. It gets so close but it doesn’t quite make it there, it pushes at it, it helps the start sound strained before it goes back to normal.
“Yeah. I was 14, it was years ago.” Risotto’s voice doesn’t even get pushed, nothing nudges it. Low, monotonous, unfeeling. His face doesn’t move, his posture doesn’t move. But Prosciutto can almost feel the aura of pure aggressive hatred. It almost chokes him, how much emotion fits into this man in this moment.
“Doesn’t mean he should be out. He killed someone. I bet if he’d killed someone the jury cared about, he’d never get out.”
“Probably. Not much I can do unless I kill him myself. That’d be too kind of me. I hope he thinks about him every fucking day. I hope he wakes up and thinks about the child he killed. I hope he looks at his own children and thinks about the child he took. I hope he suffers. It’s the only thing I can do—hope he fucking hates himself.” His voice finally changes, there’s venom, pure snake like hissing in the word suffer. Nothing else shakes, nothing else moves, but the ‘suffer’ comes from somewhere deep within this man filled with more grief than a graveyard.
“I hope someone else kills him. Not you. I don’t want you to be a murderer.”l
“And if I was? If I took this one waste of space from this world, would that somehow make me worse to you?”
He thinks. He thinks far shorter of a time than he would admit to anyone because logically a question like that needs at least 5 minutes, to 15 to at least a couple hours.
He thinks 30 seconds.
“No.”
And silence falls like a curtain, resets their scene, shows that actors must switch places—but he can see the smile, tiny smile, tugging at the corners of his co-star's face. He likes it way more than he could ever admit to when he sort of smiles.
“Does Illuso think I don’t eat chicken?” Risotto has tiny tells for confusion, genuine confusion—none of them show up. This is a conversation starter question, not ‘I genuinely need to know so badly please tell me’. If he didn’t know, it’d not end the conversation.
“Illuso thinks you’re a vegan and don’t eat unhealthy food I think. We don’t—you only eat risotto apparently, so.” He doubts he literally only ate risotto, he probably ate something else at some point—he’s convinced he saw him at least drink coffee. Maybe. Now he isn’t actually sure.
“No. I only ate risotto last year. I actually like chicken this year.” Ignoring the fact chicken risotto does, in fact, exist, he can definitely understand what he means. He likes chicken outside of it being with rice nowadays.
“I don't like chicken that much. I’m not big on meat most of the time.” How ironic is it for his name to be ham when he doesn’t much enjoy eating it. In fact, ham is the only food he can’t force down. Reminds him of being drunk, something else he doesn’t like.
“Even if I didn’t like it, I wouldn’t tell Sorbet ‘no’ for something this minor.” He’s never quite understood the relationship. He feels like surely Risotto would be closer to Gelato, like he is, because Gelato is as capable of being quiet and monotone as they are. Gelato is almost elegant in his silence, reminds him of cult leaders because of it. Gelato can carry an air of being better than you and you might be tricked to believe it—Sorbet sinks to your level, talks to you as an equal but knows he’s above you. Sorbet pretends that he’s not a fatherly figure to half the people in his life and it agitates him sometimes. He shouldn’t automatically be respected more as a child than an equal, first of all, but Sorbet shouldn’t try to hide that view of him either.
“You two are close, aren’t you?” He settles for it instead of asking why, how—because he loves Sorbet despite his odd relationship with his aura. It’s certainly an attempt at being friendly but Prosciutto knows that Sorbet only sees Gelato as his true equal.
Prosciutto is convinced Sorbet judges him as harshly as Gelato does. When Gelato does it, it’s allowed and mutual. When Sorbet does it, it feels like a sharp pain. Reminds him of his lack of father, how the only father figure he has does nothing but judge him. Sorbet is hardly older than him but he reminds him of how much he lacks every time he sees him.
In truth, and Prosciutto knows it deep inside too, Sorbet holds no contempt for him—he isn’t judged, he’s empathised with, he’s cared for—and when you’ve never had it, every action feels like an attack, a manipulative attempt to make him lower his guard. To be cared for by someone that shows it in showing off and being mean like Gelato feels better, when you’ve never had a relationship with an older person, even a little bit, that feels like being cared for in an honest sense. Even if not as an equal.
“Brothers.” Risotto says it so calmly, like it isn’t a revelation that he could never expect. They’re brothers? That certainly would explain some things. It would explain why they’re close, why Sorbet can get him to do things, why Sorbet wants to invite him everywhere—he’d certainly invite Pesci to come with a fair bit, if he was being excluded.
“Actual?” He doesn’t even mean it through adoption or blood. He means if they grew up together, if they share parents, if they share memories of their past that nobody else can understand like they do, if they think of each other as the thing that will stay consistent in their lives—he’ll leave his parents, he’ll never leave Pesci. That’s what he wants but he fears he may come across wrong.
“Might as well be.” It feels like he understood but nothing else follows. Perhaps it doesn’t need to, perhaps that’s enough of an explanation for him to get it.
“That was your brother in the dorm,” Risotto states, after another silence—he’s never heard him start this many conversations. He feels honoured and guilty—is he so bad that Risotto has to help? He has less skills than him a lot of the time!
“They’ve nicknamed him Pesci.” He states back. He doesn’t know what else to say, there wasn’t a question attached.
“Suits him. Hair looks like a fin. You close?” There it is. Some sense of direction for this conversation, he can follow the handbook of social interaction to the natural end of a conversation like this.
“Eeeh. You know how—half brother, you know? We are pretty fucking mean to each other a lot. I’m mean to his face, he tells on me a lot even when he isn’t upset—told on me, he’s a grown man. If he’s upset, He’ll be as mean back and I’ll know to back off. So yeah. I guess that’s being close? We’re self sufficient, I don’t take care of him or anything. A lot of people think I’m his fucking caretaker but children, the disabled and people in conservationships despise me so.”
He’s scared children since he was a child himself for his interest in looking at disabled ladybugs or his fascination with the hypotheticals of government mind control—he’s been fascinated by the uncomfortable ideas of life since he was a baby. Never in a sense that derives pleasure from pain but in the sense that’s fascinated by propaganda films, watches them on loop in the attic on a shitty iPad screen from websites telling him Bianca is interested and approaching his location, rapidly.
The disabled have been afraid of him since he started staring at them, openly, with his little autistic eyes and wondering, making up stories of what happened, and then loudly started recounting them to an afraid Pesci. He’s been loudly telling stories, as a child, of massive fires and large bombings—he’s compared real knowledge of wounds he’s gained, he’s gone to displays of war photography and stared into haunted eyes, wondering where they are now, wondering how miserable they must be—the disabled found him very uncomfortable as a child. For a good reason, he reasons. He thinks he has more tact now.
“Not the elderly?”
“Old women love me. Old men like me. I’ve never met an old nonbinary person but I’m sure they’d like me too. They call me an old soul. They’ve been saying I’m old for my age since I was old enough to talk.” It’s partly his fascination with dark concepts in life. He’s been interested in death since he was too small to talk. He’s been surrounded by elderly people much of his life, as most people in Italy are. He’s used to hearing about death, cancer, tumours and dementia—he’s never been more fascinated by Melone than hearing he’s also interested in death in a sense, the genealogy of people involves death after all.
He’s never fallen into a romantic interest harder than seeing Risotto doodling skulls in an art class they had together—skulls with pieces takes off, digested in a sense, lobotomised in another. He’s never been more fascinated by a person than seeing someone else as fascinated with the deadly pieces of biology. He’s never been more interested than when he realised that this fascination continues, for both of them, into the blood, into the veins, into the muscles, and how they can come to rot and decay. Nothing has fascinated him as much since he got his sights sets on being interested in aging of anything, everything—animals, humans, buildings, nature—anything.
“You are mature.” Another statement, he can’t bounce, he can’t continue—Risotto states and expects him to know how to respond. He doesn’t even know if this is a compliment—he doesn’t know if that’s true.
“You are as well.” He settles.
They settle. Into silence that is, yet again. Their conversations are short, pieces of conversation, because they don’t know how to jump to another topic naturally. They’re stilted like the stop motion he used to watch Pesci make in their attic.
“Metallica is touring again,” Prosciutto starts this time. Statement. He starts with a statement in case that’s how Risotto would like to converse today—maybe he would like to make statements, related in topic, at each other instead.
“They are.” Silence threatens them. Normally it’s soothing, this is a threat, this is awkward. He needs to ask something.
“Did you go see them?” Nailed it.
“I did. A cousin wanted to go with me.” Risotto shrugs along with his speech, almost too cool to care—he is too cool to care. Prosciutto cares very little but not in the cool way, in the boring way that says you’ve only been interested in things that can’t last.
“Do you… have a favourite song?” He has to save this. He started this conversation. It has to be worth having. He needs to save it.
“To see live? Or to listen to?” Oh thank God Risotto asks follow-up questions. He could kiss this man—more than usual.
“Both?” He didn’t think this far.
“I like Metallica.” A way to say all, he’s convinced.
“Even live?” Every band has songs that sound worse live. He’s been to a couple concerts of bands he hates, a couple he loves, and he’s always noticed the audiences energy fall in the middle of certain songs.
“The house Jack built.”
“…That is a pretty good one.” And yet again he has no follow up he might be a little stupid.
“Do you have a favourite song?” Risotto takes the reigns again, he has never enjoyed that more in his life—being allowed to not overthink everything for once.
“In general?” He realises as he says it. Probably not. The conversation is Metallica, not music.
“From Metallica.” He feels so stupid.
“Oh. Fade to black.”
Silence. Great. He’s fucked it. He’s definitely fucked it.
“What do you like about it?” Risotto asks, willing to hear him out on why his favourite song is probably one of the softest things Metallica has put out in their whole career. Or maybe wondering why it’s the suicidal one. He doesn’t really want to talk about it.
“I don’t like singing all that much. It has a very long outro. Also, sometimes Metallica hurts my ears and that one doesn’t ever because it’s quiet so I can listen to it even when I’m overwh—I’m autistic we should establish that here.” He’s lying, Risotto knows, they don’t discuss it. He realises he’s a hypocrite to demand honesty but it’s not wholly a lie, just leaves out the pathetic part.
“Do you plan to put anything up?” Risotto asks, finally not states, to start a communication with him, “On your walls. Ever.”
“No. Pesci might,” ‘I have nothing that I care about enough to display’ almost slips out. He’s seen Risotto’s, filled to the brim with art and pictures and the books he’s reading on the shelves and more drawers closed and—Risotto makes his space lived in so effortlessly. Prosciutto’s shelf was empty of everything but bare essentials until Pesci put something on today, just as he arrived. Pesci loves things, Pesci takes interest, Pesci can fill their space.
“Could at least put your diploma up,” Risotto states. States again. He’s back to stating, not asking—he’s back to voicing his own opinion and expecting him to know how to follow up. He’s back to being unfair in how much pressure he puts on one end of the conversation.
“I could.” But he doesn’t really care either way. It’s perfectly content in his suitcase. It doesn’t have feelings on being displayed.
“I’ll put it up for you,” Risotto talks with such certainty he becomes convinced that he should let him in moments—it doesn’t matter to him anyway. He doesn’t really care about graduating from whatever school. He won’t even really care about graduating from this one outside the credibility it gets him for work—he’s bad at enjoying the material, knowing the ink will age or that the paper will decompose.
“Thanks.”
Should he care about things? Everyone else does. Ghiaccio and Melone don’t have any pictures of the group up on their walls but it’s Melone’s background on his laptop. That feels like the same level of commitment as having as your actual wall—Melone stares at that laptop more than he looks at his walls, at least, so it must be more important.
Gelato put that picture up right underneath a picture of his husband. That had left him speechless, coming in to ask for his charger back. To be placed in the vicinity of the most important person of those two’s lives, each other, had left him speechless.
He didn’t know where risotto put his for a long time. He had figured they were the same, shoved it in the closet for the time being, waited for it to fade before disposing of it. He had figured he, Ghiaccio and Risotto had been the people with normal emotions, the others were soft and annoying.
He doesn’t see Risotto’s wallet much, evidently. He doesn’t really peak at it, watch him open it. Risotto doesn’t really open it much either, most things can be played digitally and they both seem to shop mostly online. They don’t like people. It’s something relatable. Prosciutto loves looking at people, doesn’t like people looking at him. Risotto doesn’t seem to enjoy crowds. It makes sense.
It’s in his fucking wallet. He had found it was in his wallet late last school year. That felt too impactful. He shoved it on a bottom shelf as soon as he saw it in the black little thing, to display it at least slightly—not too close to his heart. He doesn’t want to see that he cares, it can’t be at his eye level no matter what he does. He’d rather be in this larger in group than with Ghiaccio in his own group of uncaring assholes.
“Should take a new picture. With Pesci.” It feels so strange, to hear Risotto think of his brother—even if not by his birth name. It feels odd that there’s signs Risotto cares so much more than he does sometimes, like a person that’s normal. He fears the possibility Risotto cares because that means he’s the broken one amongst all of them, because even Ghiaccio cares. Even Ghiaccio acknowledges that he and Melone care about each other on such a deep level that Prosciutto can never hope to understand with his broken heart and his rotten core.
They’d been both thinking of the picture. How had they both been thinking about something so insignificant and stupid—something he’d mocked to Gelato. Gelato had mocked it back. Why would both of them care for it so badly? Why had he almost felt like he cared about it?
“Definitely. Gelato would love to, I’m sure.”
Silences follow them consistently. It’s like a stalker, or a baby duck confusing him for its mother—silence follows nonetheless, if cute or if sinful, sincere or evil, good or disturbing.
“Haven’t seen their car,” Risotto states. They’re approaching fast, they should have, unless they were talking for almost five minutes after the two of them left.
That seems completely possible. Prosciutto sort of hopes it isn’t about them. Pesci doesn’t have to know all the things his friends do—there’s a time and place for things he does and Pesci has nothing to do with his most embarrassing moments. Pesci should know him to have some difficult moments but his younger brother should not see him at his worst, nor hear of his worst moments.
Including possibly insulting cops with implications about pigs and ham perhaps right to their face. Which he has heard he’s done. Is that the origin of Prosciutto? That would certainly be a cool way to get a nickname. He doubts it is, based on the laughs coming with the name for the first week. He doesn’t know exactly what he did but surely it was drunk and definitely embarrassing.
“They might have taken a different route,” he reasons, “Or just not left on time.”
“True.”
The parking lot near the entrance is fairly large, mostly empty, with no cars that look anything like Sorbets. They do, however, immediately notice Melone’s motorcycle and Melone herself standing by the door, on the phone, speaking quickly in a language Prosciutto doesn’t understand. She looks frustrated, nonetheless.
“Greek.” Risotto fills him in, as if he knew that Prosciutto was confused—it’s odd, how Prosciutto feels Risotto has studied him as much as he has studied Risotto. Like Risotto intentionally seeks him for signs of emotions he doesn’t think he has any tells for.
“Figured. Do you speak?” He’s never taken Risotto for knowing all that many languages—he got the impression he knows at least some English as well as Italian. Sicilian most definitely. He’s seen Arabic writing on a postcard on his desk before, presumably with the assumption Risotto would understand, making four. Prosciutto feels a little insecure remembering how much more talented people around him are, especially if Risotto also speaks Greek.
“Melone taught me whore and shit.” He feels bad that he feels good about that. He’s happy to not be that outclassed.
“Ah. So no.”
“If you want to have a conversation exclusively with the words whore and shit, yes, I do speak Greek.”
“Fair enough…”
It’s when the Melone’s phone call ends and he slides against the wall like some kind of dramatic teen in a TV show, head in his hands, and looks ready to cry, that they finally stop looking vaguely in each others direction in a way that would be awkward if they both didn’t know Risotto hates sudden eye contact and Prosciutto is respecting his space.
“Are you okay?” Risotto is the first to speak, walks over, attempts to calm Melone down—Prosciutto stands as useless as usual. He’s not very good at this emotion thing. It’s fine, Risotto’s capable enough of pretending he is—or being, he doesn’t know.
“I don’t… I’d rather talk to Ghia.” It’s such an honest tone it almost throws Prosciutto for a loop, he’s never heard this before. He’s never heard Melone sound so true in what he’s saying, like he has no ulterior motives, like he’s not a smiling cat leading someone into a trap. He’s not someone playing with others in this moment, he’s young—Prosciutto forgets Melone is younger than him sometimes, just a little bit. Both him and Ghia are a little bit younger than the rest of them, early graduates. They’re Pesci’s age.
“Okay. Do you want me to ask when he’s coming?”
Melone shakes his head, deep breaths in, deep breaths out. Melone’s like he’s listening to someone talk him through his emotions, holding five fingers in front of him, then four, then three—he’s doing the sense thing that’s never helped Prosciutto, once.
He doesn’t even feel the need to judge it. He always does it when he sees people he doesn’t like doing it. People he doesn’t care about, he would say, if he knew that he cares for people in the first place.
When Ghiaccio comes, he’s not himself—not the him Prosciutto knows. There’s an attempt at contact with Melone almost immediately, hands on his shoulders, head low to be near—he’s silent. He’s never seen him this silent.
Pesci seems confused too. Means he was about as loud as usual while in the car.
“Mum?” And there’s just a nod, slow, before Ghiaccio continues, “I’ll kill her, if you want.”
“Thanks. One day. I don’t want you in jail while our child is young.” Their cat. Prosciutto knows this to mean their ugly little cat—it’s not that ugly. Prosciutto just thinks it’s spoiled.
He doesn’t even feel the slightest urge to judge in that moment. Gelato doesn’t look at him. Gelato doesn’t even look away from Melone, who he doesn’t even like that much, as if waiting for something he can do to help.
“Does not mean I forgive you by the way. Fuck you.” Melone says, finally, voice returning to her—it feels oddly good to hear her sound annoying again.
It’s in the way Ghia nods, pats Melone on the shoulder and immediately goes back to pretending to ignore her (Prosciutto can see their hands, Melone seeking his out to hold. He doesn’t resist) that Prosciutto, for the first time, sees how these two people could like each other. How they could be in love.
In that moment, he acknowledges he cares for them. A little bit.