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Caesar was a man of elegance, such as he told himself; indulging in the finer things in life. Nazionali cigarettes, rich espresso, and Piedirosso wine lingered on his tongue as he held his head high amidst the crowds.
It was the bitterness of these things that grounded him in reality, their rich, earthy tastes calming his mind. It could be said that these things clouded his mind too, refusing to let his thirst for revenge leave the corners of his mind. But it was better than the taste of cheap cigarettes and dirt, or the blood that used to linger between his teeth in his rougher years - a time that he’d rather forget.
But every time he looked at the man across from him, he was reminded of his dangerous, foolish younger self yet again. So, he ordered an espresso and got out a cigarette, hoping the bitterness would distract him yet again.
“Hey… Don’t smoke in a small room like this. It stinks,” the man complained. Glaring at the fool shuffling cards across from him, Caesar put the cigarette out on his finger. It was far from the worst injury he’d gotten, and he could heal it with the Ripple, but it was worth the look he was given for that stunt.
Joseph Joestar, the current bane of his existence, continued shuffling the cards as Caesar plotted how to use tricks to part him from his money. It should be no pittance to the big idiot, he figured, seeing as he was born into a high-class life with all the money he could ever want. How he turned out the way he did surprised Caesar, given that Joseph had been raised by Erina and Speedwagon, the former of the pair supposedly being a formidable woman.
Well, it didn’t matter. This rich brat that supposedly defeated Santana and Straizo was nothing but an overgrown child to him, winning all of his fights by flukes and tricks. He respected Speedwagon and knew that he loved his nephew dearly, but he was pretty soft-hearted in comparison to the young men he accompanied.
Caesar decided that he would beat this brat at his own game, and began angling his foot as he leaned back in his chair. The mirror on his shoe shone with the reflected lamplight.
As it turned out, Joseph wasn’t all that bad. He couldn’t hold too much of a grudge when the young man nearly sacrificed his own life to save Speedwagon and himself - even when he didn’t have a reason to save Caesar in particular.
Why was it that he was always getting the wrong idea about the ones who would later save his life? At least, unlike his father, Joseph had survived the encounter underneath the Colosseum. But the experience left him with poisonous rings in his body, putting him on a time limit to get stronger before the poisons released.
Caesar didn’t know if he was being driven by respect for Joseph’s deep-down nobility, gratefulness that Joseph saved him, or guilt for his misunderstanding. But the outcome was the same: he had taken him to his master, Lisa Lisa, and joined him in Ripple training.
It seemed that Joseph liked him too, especially when the “water gun” advice he’d given back in Rome helped the other man at the Hell Climb Pillar, and perhaps even more after Caesar caught him before he fell. After that entire experience, their transition from acquaintances into friends was a wordless one.
The following days of training were grueling, and Caesar knew that it would continue to be that way for the next three weeks. He took solace in the fact that this was making them stronger, but true relief only came at the end of the day, when the pair had finished that day’s training. They could shower, eat dinner, brush their teeth, then go to bed.
Caesar was just finishing up brushing his teeth when Joseph came in. “Damn it! Coach takes forever to remove the mask…” Joseph complained.
Caesar rolled his eyes, and he spit the toothpaste into the sink. “Having it taken off is a privilege here, not a right. Don’t forget that.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” Joseph let out a sight, grabbing his toothbrush. “You could at least be a little more compassionate here, jeez…”
At that, Caesar raised an eyebrow. “Compassionate?” he repeated, voice raising with amusement.
“Yeah, compassionate. You think it’s easy? If I’m not being choked every few minutes, then I have to watch you kiss every girl on the mainland while these sexy lips are still trapped!”
Caesar burst into laughter, doubling over onto the sink counter as his body shook. Joseph’s face turned bright red and he shoved at Caesar’s shoulder. “Hey, stop laughing! It’s not funny, asshole!”
Caesar wheezed as he straightened himself up again. “Oh, poverino. Not getting kisses that aren’t from your grandmother. Che orrendo!” He took a deep breath to compose himself as Joseph scowled at him. “Perhaps you should focus, for once, on getting that mask off. You’ll have worse things to complain about if you keep slacking.”
“God, you sound like Loggins. How long have you spent around those guys?” Joseph questioned. “Long enough to learn how to goof off and yell at me at the same time?”
“Goof off- I’ve already mastered the breathing rhythm!” Caesar shoved Joseph’s chest, suddenly shouting. “Stop being a child and worry about yourself!”
“I’m not wrong, am I?! I had to go to the fucking vendors with a list I can’t read to get the groceries because you couldn’t stop being a lecher for five minutes!”
“I told you to wait at the lamppost! And then I had to look for you because you got yourself lost in that market!”
“If kissing all those girls meant nothing, I wouldn’t be surprised if you kissed me too!”
All the shouting suddenly stopped as Joseph’s words hung in the air, creating a tense silence as they stared at each other in shock. Caesar was stunned as he processed what his friend had said, and Joseph’s face was starting to go red as he realized what he had just blurted out.
“Um, I mean, uh…” Joseph took a step back towards the open door behind him. “I-I’ll come back later, you can finish brushing your teeth first-”
Before he’d finished his sentence, Caesar snapped out of his daze and closed the distance between them. He held Joseph’s jaw and kissed him, and he nearly laughed again as he heard a muffled sound of surprise from the other man.
Now, he knew that this was wrong - both in terms of legality and morality, the latter according to the Church. But Caesar liked women and was quite certain of it, feeling secure enough in sexuality and masculinity to kiss his friend with no strings attached. It would teach him a lesson about constantly running his mouth, Caesar thought.
Joseph’s hands squeezed his shoulders, holding him in place; it was almost as if he didn’t know whether to push him away or pull him closer. As for Caesar, he didn’t mind it at all. He was still holding Joseph’s jaw, retaining control with only one hand. He moved his lips against Joseph’s, but suddenly stepped back, pushing Joseph away.
That was a bad idea, Caesar realized. Because when he’d kissed him, he ended up getting slapped in the face with an overwhelmingly sweet taste.
As he scrunched up his face from his bitter-loving tastebuds being overcome with a pure sugary taste, he remembered Joseph mentioning that he liked bubblegum and this strange “cola” drink from New York, among other sweet things. How he was able to stay in shape despite consuming all these things, especially if he’d never done training, completely astounded Caesar.
“When’s the last time you brushed your teeth?! Back in New York?!” Caesar hissed. He was about ready to shove toiletries into Joseph’s hands himself.
Joseph’s face was still red as he wiped his mouth. “What the fuck? You suddenly kiss me, and now you’re getting on my case about this? I was about to clean up for bed, but you distracted me!”
Caesar felt a small pounding between his eyes. “Jojo-”
“Stop complaining and get to it already!”
“-is what you’ll say!” Joseph snickered, having said Caesar’s words at the exact same time as him. Caesar felt his headache grow stronger. “Didn’t think I’d be getting drilled on tooth-brushing too here. What, are you planning on kissing me to check before bed?”
Now, it was Caesar’s turn to go red as he quickly turned to hide it.
“Goodnight, Jojo,” he grumbled, storming out of the bathroom.
Caesar went back to his bedroom, wasting no time in stripping to his underwear and climbing into bed. He was tempted to bury his head under the damn pillow, but he was sure that he wasn’t desperate enough to do that.
As tired as he was, Caesar’s mind was still active. He couldn’t understand, why was Joseph so casual about kissing another man?
Did he fancy him, or did he think nothing of it at all? Was Joseph just not averse to kissing a friend, regardless of gender? And Caesar himself, why was kissing the idiot the first conclusion he leapt to? And his only complaint about it was that Joseph’s kiss tasted too sweet? Was the training exhausting his mind so much that he was starting to not care about the world and its expectations outside of the island?
And most importantly, why was he still thinking about that damn kiss?!
Caesar shook his head, closing his eyes and trying to push those thoughts from his mind. They had training tomorrow, he couldn’t afford to be distracted by any of this. They were the last line of defence for humanity, and they needed to train to be able to match the Pillar Men. They needed to prepare for the battle, to settle the score that had lasted since their grandfathers’ time.
They had to get stronger, Joseph and him both.
Caesar groaned and turned over, burying his face in his pillow. Goddammit, he just couldn’t win.
The following weeks only continued to prove that Caesar wasn’t as straight as he initially thought.
Starting from that kiss in the bathroom, their interactions turned into something less casual, but more friendly. Teasing was now accompanied with more touching, competitions involved increasingly more intimate demands from the winner, training was motivated just by a look at the other. And yes, more kisses were stolen whenever they got the chance.
Caesar knew that it probably wasn’t natural to do that with a friend, but they hadn’t quite put a label on their relationship yet.
Then again, they were training to use sunlight kung fu magic to kill vampire-eating monsters. And he was living with Joseph Joestar and all his antics. Nothing about this was natural, and he had already gotten desensitized.
“Caesar! Hey, Caesar!”
He was broken out of his thoughts by Joseph rushing up to him, eyes smiling with some sort of mischief in mind.
Caesar sighed and prepared for the worst. “What is it, Jojo?”
“Hey, what’s with that voice? Seriously, you sound like I’m going to blow something up,” Joseph pouted. He was quick to switch back to that devilish grin that couldn’t quite be hidden by the mask. “But anyway, Coach is distracted, and Loggins and Messina are helping Suzi Q on the mainland!”
Caesar raised an eyebrow. “So?”
“What do you mean, ‘so’? Isn’t this the perfect opportunity to sneak off? C’mon, no one’s gonna know!”
At this point, Caesar was sure that everyone on the island already knew. The coaches arranged for most of their training regimen to be completed together to keep an eye on them, Suzi Q liked to tease them sometimes (Caesar would not throttle a woman, but if she mentioned one more time that it would save her time on laundry if they shared a room, he might be tempted to), and he was pretty sure that Master Lisa Lisa just knew everything.
Caesar began walking down the corridor. “Jojo, are you even hearing yourself? You can’t keep asking me to take off your damn mask every time you want to fool around - which I know is the reason why you keep asking for this!”
“Come on, now. That’s not the only reason and you know it,” Joseph snickered.
He rolled his eyes. “That doesn’t matter. We can’t allow personal feelings to interfere with something like this.” Caesar continued walking, coming up on a small nook of the castle that seemed to always be covered in a thin layer of dust. “Don’t forget the reason we’re here! If you let yourself keep being distracted from training, how do you plan to accomplish anything? You have to take it seriously!”
This time, Joseph said nothing in reply. Caesar couldn’t see his expression with his back turned to him, but he was sure that he was following him down the hall, watching and waiting.
There was a moment of silence when all that could be heard was the distant sound of waves crashing, seabirds crying, and the sound of their breaths.
Suddenly, Caesar turned around and grabbed Joseph’s wrist, pulling him into the hidden space of the corridor. With the lightest touch of the repelling Ripple to Joseph’s jaw, the mask detached and fell into Caesar’s hand. Joseph backed himself against the wall, pulling Caesar closer by his shoulder support brace.
“Giving that same old spiel, but leading us to a place like this?” Joseph remarked with that confident smirk that Caesar wouldn’t admit he liked. “You’re so easy to read, Caesar.”
Caesar stepped closer, pressing Joseph further into the wall, and silenced his cocky words with a bruising kiss. Joseph let out a satisfied hum as his hands wrapped around Caesar’s back, melting into the kiss like butter. Caesar broke the kiss to catch his breath, but only moved just far enough away for that. He could feel Joseph’s breath so close to him, their lips still practically touching.
“Don’t think I’m going to keep indulging you like this,” Caesar warned. Joseph’s eyes seemed like sparkling aquamarines from this close.
He could feel Joseph’s smile against his mouth. “Sure. Keep saying that, Caesarino.”
Caesar closed his eyes and kissed Joseph again, though with more gentle passion. Joseph willingly let Caesar take the lead, as experienced as he was, as he deepened their kiss.
Joseph’s mouth still tasted sweet, and the flavour stayed despite how long he’d been on the island. But with how much Caesar let himself be snuck off to kiss him, he no longer found the overwhelming sweetness to be repulsive. Rather, he’d found himself growing to like it, as with everything about the other man.
The moment he’d realized it was at breakfast one morning, when he was putting jam on his toast. Lisa Lisa wanted them to eat lightly so as to not upset their stomachs with all their training, but jam was a luxury she allowed to keep their spirits up. But when he tasted the sweet strawberry preserves, his first thought wasn’t of other strawberry foods or how he’d never liked putting jam on his toast as a child, but of Joseph and his kisses.
The realization made his face so red that the instructors thought he’d suddenly caught a fever. Lisa Lisa said nothing, but he’s sure she knew.
Even now, Caesar enjoyed the sweetness on his tongue as Joseph greedily entwined it with his own. He wondered what Joseph thought about the bitterness that he was sure to taste, if it was even there at all.
A distant sound of a foghorn startled them, breaking them apart. Caesar was quick to attach the mask back to Joseph’s face, then left the hidden corner without looking back. Hopefully, the people on the mail boat wouldn’t guess what he had been up to. But then again, everyone did seem to know about it these days.
American homes seemed a lot more friendly than Italian ones. Of course, Caesar did not think this lightly, as Italy was the country of his birth that he had pride in. But when you’ve lived under a fascist dictatorship for most of your life, the sense of safety and peace within American borders was pretty jarring.
Of course, America didn’t exactly take kindly to Italian immigrants like himself. But the protection of the Speedwagon Foundation and a valid visa (also provided by Speedwagon) made his life a little easier.
Sitting in an armchair with a book on his lap, Caesar looked at the small ring on his hand. It was a little loose on his finger, as it hadn’t been the finger measured for the ring, but it was a reminder of the bond he shared and the vow of commitment he made. Even if they couldn’t be married legally, all that mattered was that they were husbands in the eyes of their family and friends.
Thinking of his husband, he looked at the clock. Joseph had been at work for eight hours now. He’d started up his own real estate company, and the resurgence of the economy from the Depression brought him many customers. It made sense that he’d have to spend a long time there, though it was amusing that he seemed to be taking working hard seriously for once.
But that left Caesar alone at home for those hours. His heart ached with loneliness, just as his muscles ached from the deep wounds Wamuu had given him.
He could only vaguely remember Joseph carrying him out of the hotel, running as fast as he could back to civilization to get him help. While Lisa Lisa made a bargain with the Pillar Men in their stead, Joseph had handed Caesar and Messina over to medical personnel. And after the fiasco of everyone thinking Joseph was dead, the pair were eventually “married” the next month.
Caesar was left with an aching body and a walking stick, unable to work because of his injuries. The Speedwagon Foundation was taking care of his treatment, and he was told that he would eventually be able to live a normal life without any restrictions, save for the risk of the scar tissue tightening from weather pressure fluctuations. Speedwagon himself was saving him a spot at his company, and Caesar received a few visitors during the day.
But he was lonely. Perhaps not as lonely as before, but his chest ached when he was left for a long time in an empty house.
With a small sigh, Caesar reached towards the table and took a lollipop from the candy jar that Joseph insisted on keeping. He put the candy in his mouth, gently sucking it and going back to reading his book. The artificial sugary taste spread across his tongue and made him think, just when he was distracted enough, that Joseph was there with him.
Nearly half an hour later, the front door opened. “Caesar, I’m back!” Joseph’s voice called.
Caesar bookmarked his page and put his book aside just in time to see his husband come bounding around the corner to greet him. “Welcome back, amore mio,” Caesar replied, smiling up at him from the armchair.
Joseph giggled in such a way that it reminded Caesar of a schoolboy in love. But his smile faded a bit as he looked Caesar over.
“Come on, you shouldn’t smoke in such a small room,” he chided, using a flick of his wrist to steal the stick from Caesar’s mouth. He could see the words die on Joseph’s tongue as he realize what he had just stolen.
“It’s not a cigarette,” Caesar chuckled. “Speedwagon won’t let me have any. He said it might mess with my medication.”
“Huh.” Joseph handed the lollipop back to him. “Thought you told me you didn’t like sweets.”
“I did. And I stand by that.”
“Then why do you-”
Joseph suddenly went quiet, then began to smile deviously. That never meant good things for Caesar.
“Ohhh, I see how it is.” Joseph poked Caesar’s chest teasingly. “You don’t like them, but you still have them when I’m gone? That means they remind you of me, don’t they?”
Caesar turned his face away, squeezing his eyes shut. “Don’t be stupid. American cigarettes taste far worse than Italian ones, so I-”
“Didn’t you just say Uncle Speedwagon wouldn’t let you have any? You can’t fool me.”
Caesar let out a huff, patting his hand around the side of the armchair to find his walking stick. He didn’t know whether he’d need it to make a getaway or to fend off the Cheshire cat grinning above him yet.
He stopped moving as he felt a kiss on his forehead. He looked up to see Joseph with a fond yet sad smile on his face.
“I’m sorry for being gone so long.” He knelt beside the armchair, reaching to grab hold of Caesar’s arm. “You could go to Granny’s, you know. Smokey’s there too, and I’m sure Suzi and Mum would visit there too. You don’t need to stay here all day.”
Dammit, that bastard could read him too well. He supposed it was a valuable tool for his real estate work, reading clients and parting other fools from their money.
“It’s not like I have much choice, Joestar,” Caesar reminded him. He could see Joseph’s gaze moving up the arm he held, covered in so many scars.
“I know. I’m sorry.” Joseph kissed his arm. He shuffled a bit closer to the armchair, leaning his chest on Caesar’s legs. He looked up at Caesar with pleading eyes.
Ever since they reunited, and when he’d had to show the results of the battle on his body, Joseph hadn’t stopped blaming himself for Caesar’s situation. Caesar had told him time and time again that it wasn’t his fault, and the argument from that day was talked out and forgiven. Even if Caesar felt a little betrayed by Lisa Lisa telling Joseph about his past, Joseph seemed more compassionate than he’d been before Caesar was hospitalized.
So, even though Joseph had been trying to comfort him, Caesar leaned down to kiss him instead. Ever the affectionate sort, even just a little bit was enough to cheer him up. Caesar hoped that it would be true of this time as well.
Joseph reached up to hold his shoulders as Caesar wrapped his arms around his neck. Bolder now, with the confidence that came from having a good teacher, Joseph deepened their kiss. Caesar knew that Joseph didn’t have the same reaction to sweet and bitter tastes as he did, but he could tell that Joseph enjoyed the sugary taste of the lollipop nonetheless.
For now, Caesar felt happy. Perhaps it was because he’d spent so long living a solitary life, but once he’d gotten a taste of real companionship, he couldn’t bear to be on his own again. But Joseph was home, the house was no longer empty, and everything finally felt right.
The lollipop had slipped from Caesar’s fingers and fallen to the floor, forgotten in the midst of it all.