Archive of Our Own

“Ask Mouse to read that part, Mr. Davies!”

“Yeah, Mr. Davies! Ask Mouse! He sounds like a girl, anyway!”

He is eleven years of age.

A class of twenty schoolboys have their eyes on him, their beady eyes and wide grins reminding him of stone gargoyles, their faces stuck in an eternal grimace. They hissed and cackled like hyenas after their prey, their mouths drooling with anticipation.

It took two hard thuds, coming from the teacher's desk, to silence the class. Dorian could hear shifting chairs as they turned back towards the teacher. But he wouldn't know. He didn't dare look up from his hands, balled into trembling fists between his legs.

“What's your name, young man?”

Dorian stood quickly, the chair creaking loudly and awkwardly behind him — looking up at his teacher before he bowed his head. “Dorian Red Gloria, sir.”

His voice was high-pitched, still in the blurred lines of childhood and adolescence — though he spoke in a much softer manner than the other boys, his voice calm and slow.

Unlike most of the other teachers, Mr. Raymond Davies was young. His hair was long, almost growing past his chin, dark brown like a sturdy oak. He had a strong square jaw and a long nose that had once been broken. His eyes were stern, the color of the sea, but there was kindness in them, especially as he looked at Dorian.

“Mr. Gloria.” Mr. Davies nodded. “You may sit.”

And he did. The silence surrounded the class again, as he lowered his head, putting his hands between his legs again, fingers intertwined as they dug deep into the flesh of his hands. His long curls hid his reddening face as he bit his lip, trying to swallow his tears.

“Are you all really in the sixth grade?” Mr. Davies asked. “You all sound like toddlers, pointing and laughing like that. Start with that silly business again, and you'll be sent to the principal’s office to be suspended. And you all know how much the principal loves being interrupted.” Mr. Davies spoke nonchalantly, shuffling through papers on his desk.

None dared say a word, for they knew that, once the principal had his day interrupted by a rude student, they could hear his screaming from a mile away. But Dorian looked back up at the teacher again, seeing that same kindness in his eyes. He admired his tousled shirt and blazer, his long, veiny hands. His voice was soft, but deep, full of warmth like wine.

Mr. Davies was his first.

For a week, he cried himself to sleep. I'm no different from father, Dorian thought — no different from the man he was taught to hate by his mother and his sisters.

“He's abnormal”, Cathy would say. His eldest sister said the word as if it were the lowest of insults, the most evil thing a man could be. She whispered the words to Dorian during dinner, lowering her head beside his as their wide eyes glanced at their father, smiling and chattering with the servants. “He's a sodomite. Instead of loving women, they love men, and even boys, Dorian, as young as you.”

For a week, he cried himself to sleep. And for a month, he knelt beside his bed and prayed until his knees ached, everyday, that he would not be this way — pray that, the next day, he would fall in love with a girl, or that he awoke someone different, or that he awoke normal. But the days and weeks passed, the sun rose and set, and he stayed Dorian Red Gloria. His features were soft like a girl's, his voice gentle and timid. His feelings for Mr. Davies only grew, as he lay awake thinking of his laughter, as melodic as birdsong. But it wasn't just him, anymore.

It was others. Lizzie’s boyfriend, tall and strong, and even Jane’s friend, lean as a knife, his hair a mop of brown curls. All of them would make his heart race, an odd, warm feeling building in his stomach. And he could only bite his thumb, and pretend he did not feel the way he did.

It was a bleak day in January when Mr. Davies announced he would leave the school. The sky was gray with no sun, the trees bare and dry. Dorian was far from the only student who liked Mr. Davies, young, tall and charming. And while the girls ran across the yard from their school building to say their goodbyes, Dorian stood from behind a tree, biting the inside of his cheek as he swallowed his tears, and his fingers trembled.

It was difficult to remember his face. The day he left, he swore to never think of him again.

***

Plié, Jeté, Tendu. Plié, Jeté, Tendu.

The routine was like a prayer. He watched himself in the mirror as he practiced, paying attention to the curve of his leg and the direction of his arm.

He'd missed enough of his ballet classes that semester that he had to take extra ones in the summer. His father did not mind paying for them, but for the first time in his life, he saw a look of disapproval in his father's grey eyes that horrified him. “I expected more of you”, he told Dorian. It was enough to make him cry later that night in desperation, hyperventilating as he clutched his pillow to his chest.

At 14, he still had no friends to speak of, still mocked as “Mouse” when the teachers weren't looking, still getting his hair pulled in the hallways and the back of his head hit with books. His mother had left with his sisters — “You are no son of mine” were her last words, while his sisters did not so much as say goodbye. That had been the worst day of his life.

“I like stealing”, he admitted with that childish, proud smile on his face. “Besides, I don't like girls anyway!”

His father laughed, but his mother looked horrified. It seemed as if she would rather her son be a murderer than a homosexual. But he could do with his mother's words, her cold, cold gaze, looking at Dorian not as her son, but as a cancer that had grown inside her, and never left. It was his sisters’ abandonment that hurt him the most. He could remember calling to them — Cathy, Jane, and Lizzie. Lizzie, his best friend in the whole world, leaving without a goodbye. He could still remember their gazes as their mother's chauffeur drove away, glancing at him from the back window, like long dead parents staring at him from decades-old photographs. After that, his only solace was knowing that his father would visit Mr. Price, later that afternoon. And then…

…

His father was all that he had left. He was all he had in the world. He could not disappoint him.

His constant failings came from something he could not understand. He would have vivid nightmares that would make him sweat cold, dreams of running through an endless night, with a growing pack of dogs chasing after him. A growing pack of dogs, and a soft voice that spoke to him with words he could not understand. The voice grew closer, and closer, until he heard the cry of a sheep, and woke up screaming. He'd lost his sleep. When he was not at school, he laid at home, in bed, staring at nothing as the day passed. He did not feel like drawing, he did not feel like eating, he did not even feel like practicing, something he had done ever since he was a toddler.

The heavy wooden doors to the studio suddenly opened behind him. Dorian stood in place, his heart jumping in fear as a boy entered. He, however, seemed just as scared as he was.

Their gazes met very briefly. His eyes were of a very, very dark brown, like the wet earth. He looked down again, and Dorian saw his profile, a defined cupid's bow and an aquiline nose, his eyes nearly hidden by thick curls of black hair, like Verocchio’s David. He was a skinny thing, just as he was, long hands and fingers. He wore a sleeveless leotard, revealing dark brown, reddish skin.

After him, entered a woman, thin, her dark blonde hair pulled into a tight bun. “Good morning”, Mrs. Mitchell said. “So, you two haven't gone missing after all.” She chuckled, then pointed at the boy, then Dorian. “Ravi Kumar and Dorian Gloria, yes?” She asked. Dorian nodded. He assumed the other boy did, too, but he did not look.

His name was Ravi. It meant ‘sun’, he'd told him. He was born in April, when Summer hit India. So, his mother named him ‘Ravi’. His father, an Englishman from Leeds, brought them to England, but after some time, he abandoned them, and Ravi had no memory of him. He learned English at school, as his mother spoke nearly nothing of it. It was there that his teachers noticed his dancing, and how he was recommended to this school.

“Then why are you taking extra classes?” Dorian asked, his voice still filled with the innocence of youth.

That had been many weeks after. They sat down in front of the immense mirror in the classroom, as small as ants. It felt like the safest place for both of them to be.

He noticed Ravi started to pick at his nails. He'd do it when he was nervous. “Some things started happening”, he said.

Those three years of Dorian's life were filled with bittersweet memories, like an old broken toy. He spent his days with Ravi as if the world would end the next day — and as if the only thing they could do, at that moment, was to live. It was a type of carelessness that Dorian had never in his life experienced, growing up sheltered and friendless. They'd wait for each other's classes to end before running to display windows to watch The Rolling Stones perform on TV, go to record stores and try to sneak 8 inch LPs into their coats, and when they couldn't, they ran, laughing, chests pounding with excitement and adrenaline as they screamed.

None could dance like Ravi. Dorian thought himself as a good ballerino — but Ravi moved as if he were on the moon, as if the weight of gravity did not have its effect upon him. He seemed to move at another speed entirely, sometimes, almost seemed as if his feet did not touch the ground while he danced. As the years passed, he grew into his looks, his almond-shaped dark eyes glittered with determination and the ambition of youth. His dark locks grew, glistening, soft as silk as they reached his shoulders.

In the third year of knowing one another, at seventeen, he stayed over at Dorian's home. His father was already sick by then, but they thought it was a simple fever.

“It's like a painting”, Ravi said, as they walked the grounds of the Gloria rose orchard. Even outside of ballet, his moves were graceful, as if he lived and breathed dance.

“It's one of the biggest in Europe”, Dorian said, arms behind his back. “And the biggest in England.”

Ravi pressed his hand against one rose, then ran his palm across the numerous flowers and petals along their path. “They remind me of you.”

“What do you mean?” He laughed.

“Th— ah…!” Ravi suddenly pulled his hand from one of the flowers, finding a thorn stuck on his bleeding finger.

“It's fine”, Dorian said, immediately reaching for his hand. He pulled out the thorn, wiped his thumb across where it bled. He'd done the same thing, as a child, thousands of times — he then pressed his lips to the bleeding thumb, unconsciously, but once he realized the intimate gesture he'd just done, he immediately pulled back.

“Your face is as red as the flowers”, Ravi laughed awkwardly, and Dorian proceeded to do the same.

“I'm sorry.”

“I do not mind it.”

“Others would find it repulsive.”

“I do not.”

His chest pounded like a hammer then. He and Ravi exchanged short, shy looks, and it was then he took notice of his lips, almost looking as if they were in a perpetual pout, and his eyes, the sunlight making them appear golden. Dorian rubbed his sweating plans together.

They sat under the shadow of a willow tree, the biggest in the garden, nearly half an acre long. Ravi laid in the grass, watching an ant that walked over his hand, which he then gently directed back to the ground. Dorian sat beside him. They were completely alone save for one another's company, listening to the soft buzz of the bugs and the whisper of the willow tree.

Dorian suddenly decided to lay down — but then, Ravi decided to sit up, and as their unmatched movements began to take place, they found themselves with their faces inches from one another, eyes tense and cheeks flushed. He could feel Ravi’s breath against his, warm, with a light mint scent. He couldn't remember which of them moved first. He could only remember closing his eyes, and suddenly he was on top of Ravi, the boy's hand on the nape of his neck, while Dorian's was on his waist, lips pressed together in a gentle dance.

Many had looked at them strangely before. Dorian felt their gazes even more now. When he did, he would look at Ravi, only to find his gaze also fixated on him, in fear. At that point, the outdated law known as sodomy had been lifted to allow men over 21 years to have relationships — but over 21 they were not, and it was not every English citizen that abided by the law. Both of them had heard stories, two boys caught kissing beaten, two women over 21 caught in bushes harassed by police.

“I will not let anyone touch you”, Dorian would tell Ravi, caressing his dark locks with a gentle hand.

“What shall you do?” Ravi would say, laughing. “Do a grand jeté that turns into a flying kick?” And they both would laugh, holding one another in the moonlight. Their fear would follow them, but not now, not as long as they were together.

Ravi's scholarship to Juilliard came, incidentally, just as Dorian was accepted into Oxford.

“Why won't you come with me, Dorian?” He'd asked, with a trembling voice and wet eyes. “I will have no friends in America, none but my mother.”

“I cannot say no to Oxford. I do not know if the chance will ever come to me again… There are so many ballet institutions in Europe, Ravi. Why must you go to the one farthest away?”

“You have all the money in the world, Dorian!” He exclaimed. “You can go to Harvard, or Yale, or — any of those! Why can't you understand that this chance may never come to me again? You, of all people?” Suddenly, Ravi hissed like a cat. The two of them looked down to see that the skin of his fingers bled profusely, as he had picked a bit of skin so long that his blood dripped on the floor.

“Columbia”, Dorian said quietly afterwards, after washing and putting a bandaid over Ravi’s finger. “That is in New York too, is it not?”

“Are you serious?”

“The most serious I've been in my life.”

“I'm not joking, Dorian. Are you serious? Will you really do this with me? Fly all the way across…”

“Yes, yes, a hundred times, yes!” Though his words seemed exasperated, Dorian smiled like he never had in his life. His cheeks and eyes became red as he began to cry, as did Ravi, who shook his head, before embracing him, tighter than he ever had before.

Years passed, he still found himself reminiscing on that night more than he would like, and playing out the different ways his life could have played out, had he taken the plane with Ravi.

He could not remember correctly if it had been that night or a few days later, when he received the call that his father had died.

Whenever the anniversary of his death came, he thought of it again. He had been eighteen, and it seemed as if the world was at his fingertips. Everything did. But after that call, he became Dorian Red Gloria, the fourteenth Earl of Gloria.

The day of his father's funeral was one of the worst of his life. He saw his mother and sisters for the first time in five years — Cathy was pregnant with her second child by then, with the first still suckling on her breast. Jane had recently married, and Lizzie had taken a plane from her penthouse in Paris. His mother, however, seemed to have forgotten his face altogether. And whenever he came close to her, she'd complain of a headache, removing herself to sit down.

It was the same day of Ravi’s flight, and one of the last days he saw him. He was not allowed to kiss him, less the airplane security guards that had been watching them took him away. So, he embraced Ravi, his love, his Botticelli angel, for as long as he could.

Every so often he'd get his letters. The last time he saw him, many years after, was at one of his performances at the Royal Albert Hall, doing Swan Lake. His partner was also in attendance, his husband in all but title.

***

Grant laughed. “You missed again.”

“Bloody hell!” Dorian snapped, hitting the cue stick against the billiard table in frustration.

“And you swear you're not drunk?”

“Not one bit”, he sighed, leaning over the table, crossing his arms. “I do swear, these cocktails have no alcohol in them — I've spent my night out drinking juice, like a child.”

“I'll try to find you some whiskey.” Grant stepped behind him, and rested a hand on his lower waist, just above his ass, touching the velvet of his trousers. “And then, I'll teach you how to play right.”

Dorian giggled. He curled a small blonde lock of hair around his finger, a mop of curls over his head. And then, Grant was off. He was a tall lad, skinny like a twig, wearing a blue button up and a brown suede jacket, his hair cut like a Beatle’s. He was handsome alright, but terribly arrogant, and much more uninteresting than his hippie looks would make him seem. However, he was handsome, and homosexual, which was what mattered the most to him, the Earl of Gloria.

He was in his second semester in Oxford, and still hadn't had the chance of a boyfriend, or even a shag. Ravi still lingered in his mind — and once he caught Grant staring, it wasn't long before he'd bought him a drink, then another, his eyes never leaving Dorian's chest, his half transparent shirt showing more than any other lad at that party, his bell-bottoms clinging to his legs.

Even so, it was an unnaturally boring party. Some Economics major whose parents were off to Monaco, or Morocco, and thus he decided to gather as many people as he could in their Edwardian mansion, three stories high and with a backyard as large as a football field. There were mostly straights there, squares, which was probably why — little boys in striped suits going after girls with skirts going down to their knees, with Marty Wilde and Cilla Black playing from a radio.

Dorian sighed, flicking his finger on one of the billiard balls, when he looked up, and noticed a man who stared at him.

He was short, and fat, his belly hanging from an old pair of flared sailor's jeans that had a shirt with a colorful Paisley pattern tucked into them. He had a mop of a haircut much like Grant's, and to pair it all off, a thick mustache that covered much of his upper lip.

“Hello there”, Dorian said softly, smiling. “See something you like?”

“‘Ello”, the stranger replied. He held a glass of beer in his hand, and walked in Dorian's direction. “Oi, straight to the apples and pears, innit?”

Upon close inspection, the man's clothes seemed… Old. Plain. Coupled with his accent, Dorian assumed him to be one of those scholarship kids he'd see every now and then roaming around Oxford. “Depends where you’ll lead me.” The young Earl laughed, curling a lock of hair around his finger.

“Dunno, mate”, said the man, taking short footsteps as he approached. He took a sip of his glass, and for a moment, white foam covered his moustache. It made Dorian smile. The man cocked his head towards the billiard table. “Ow's the game treatin' yer?”

“Horribly, really. Not a single ball landed… But then, I'm not quite so good at these games.”

“Ya fancy a game with balls then?” The stranger asked, gazing up at him. Dorian's eyes widened, before he erupted into laughter.

“Not many!” He sighed, still giggling. “I'm a dancer. I danced ballet for almost two decades.”

“I bet you don't fancy these sorts of games, do ya, guv’?”

“What sort?”

He shrugged. “The poor sod sort.”

That made him laugh again. And then, it was Dorian's turn to be the man offering a drink. His name was Bonham, “The first name don't matter, do it? , he said.

Suddenly, the party seemed a lot more fun. They changed the radio to a rock station, blasting Sabbath and Zeppelin. They giggled amongst themselves, pushing and nearly breaking a China cabinet. They sat at a windowsill, and were about to smoke pot when they were caught, and kicked out. They could have gone off to Carnaby street, or any other London pub — but it was Dorian that had the idea of sneaking back into the house through the enormous library.

It looked straight out of an Austen novel, with antique marble busts of members of the family, first editions of famous books that were centuries old. And then, it was Bonham's idea to start sneaking some of those books into their pockets, and then, a bag. They would leave the mansion with their hands full, carrying antique coins, books, a dagger, even one of the busts, which the Earl believed reminded him of Bonham. Bonham would finally give the young Earl the loving he so desperately wanted in his car, parked in a lovers' lane next to the Oxford dorms.

They were an odd pair — “the bear and the rose”, the Oxford students called them. The fat, short, poor Engineering student, and the tall, graceful and aristocratic art major. They'd become an attraction at parties, attracting one photographer or two, the bohemians and the hippies. Dorian let his hair grow down to his shoulders, and when he walked in a room, he'd hear sighs from women and men — but he only had eyes for his bear, his Bon-bon, as he called him. Some even knew of their crimes, inviting the Earl and Bonham to parties of veterans that they despised, so that they'd wake the next morning to see their Renoirs and Monets missing.

Before Dorian knew it, they'd grown into a group of bohemians, sleeping all day and partying all night, drinking and smoking, kissing other men in the moonlight and in velvet couches, polishing their increasing collection of valuables, making it to their exams on two hours and sleep and caffeine. He and Bonham were still close, but they'd see others, as Dorian had grown particularly attached to a shy, eccentric Economics major — the irony! — with curly dark hair and tattered clothes. James and Bonham became his closest friends, and it was with their advice that he decided to move back to Castle Gloria, offering shelter and employment within the Castle, as most of the members of their little group were homosexuals with no place to go to. Dorian loved them, and they loved him. For the first time in his life, he found himself a loving family. There were those who would leave, of course — but those who did not, stayed with him for many years.

What was initially his and Bonham's hobby, would become a full-blown operation by the time they graduated — with an accountant, a communications officer, drivers, mechanics, even official uniforms. They could never remember where the name “Eroica” would come from — it would be one of mankind's greatest mysteries, he assumed, like the names of so many great songs, bands, poems. It became both their group name, and Dorian's new alias. Eroica became his life, and his life became Eroica. And he would always do everything for Eroica. Because Dorian Red Gloria, the Earl of Gloria, would always get what he wanted.

***

“Eroica.”

He'd heard that voice before. It was always in his mind, always in his dreams. Chasing him, like a hawk after its prey. That deep baritone, hoarse from cigarettes. It would always give him shivers up his spine, it would always make him smile, especially when it spoke his name. He couldn't help it.

The Earl turned, the rain falling faintly around him in the misty, dark grey sky. It was about five in the morning, and the sun was about to rise. He was only a few feet away — a safe distance. It was discreet. Nobody would think twice if they saw them.

“Yes, Major?”

The man was nearly 6 foot and 4 inches of steel, wide and muscled like a bull in his dark blue coat, blending so well with its surroundings. He was out in the rain, a large umbrella shadowing his face, the dark circles under his eyes and his cold green eyes. His eyebrows were knit together, tense, as they often were when those eyes saw him. A cigarette burnt between his lips, adding a faint red glow to his features, highlighting a grey 5 o’clock shadow.

Meanwhile, Dorian barely kept himself from the rain, standing under a store for shelter. Even clad in his Afghan coat, he was shirtless underneath, his skin chilling to the bone.

“It is raining”, Major Eberbach said.

“So it is.”

“You were supposed to be back in the hotel half an hour ago.”

Dorian shrugged. “Why, but nobody opened the door for me. What was I to do? Use my E.P.S. to undo its lock?”

“You could have called for me.”

Dorian smiled. “You would have liked that, would you not? Me, screaming your name into the night…”

The Major pursed his lips. “Degenerate.”

“Guilty as charged.”

“Come.”

Small coquettish steps led Dorian under the umbrella with him, hugging his own arms so his hands wouldn't touch the Major. He hated it when he touched him in public. They walked in silence, the faint scent of cigarettes being the equivalent to an old, warm memory in Dorian's mind. The comfort that some would fit in the scent of their lover's clothes, I find in cigarettes. This is what he's done to my body and mind, he reminisced.

“What were you doing?” The Major asked without looking at him, his voice low and imperative.

“Must I tell you?”

“I am your commanding officer. So, yes.”

“I was not off with any KGB or Stasi, I'll let you know.”

“Where were you?”

“At a bar downtown.”

“With a man?”

“What does it matter to you?”

The Major glanced at him with knotted brows and squinted eyes, as if to say, don't you dare.

Dorian scoffed, unafraid. “And if I was? Your men go off to see the fraüleins of Hamburg behind their wives’ back all the time, do they not?”

“That is not the point.”

“What is it, then? I am a free man, not your slave. I can do as I please. Or is it that you—” He suddenly felt the Major's large hand on his back, and Dorian gasped as a bus passed in front of them, loud as thunder.

“You are as reckless as a child”, the Major rasped through gritted teeth, grabbing Dorian's arm.

“And you have the temperament of one.” He roughly pulled the arm back.

Nevertheless, he continued to walk with him toward the hotel. They walked in silence, their steps and the occasional car being the only sound they could hear.

“Yours or mine?” It was Dorian that made the question as they rode the elevator. Again, the Major did not as much as glance at him.

“Mine.”

The Earl scoffed. “Now that is a surprise.”

“It is a Sunday today.”

“And if your men wish to knock on your door?”

From his pocket, the Major took out a “DO NOT DISTURB” door sign. It made Dorian laugh. The Major would often make him laugh. He always enjoyed men who did.

And what could he say about Iron Klaus that he had not a thousand times?

It had been so many years ago now. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, his life changed forever when he first stepped inside that cold medieval German castle, like Pandora opening the forbidden pithos. He hated him in the beginning. It was difficult not to. Most people did —  the Major had a personality like acid, with his fiery temper and backwards morals to match. He only spoke to people in the imperative, and he abhorred women, elderly people, foreigners, and about any others who were not… Well, he couldn't tell. He was not a man of many friends. Or a man of any friends.

Dorian could not remember when the first night had been, which was funny, considering that, for a long time, it was his deepest desire. But he could not, for the life of him, remember when it was the first time that the Major dragged him into a hotel room, hanging the “DO NOT DISTURB” sign on the doorknob, tearing off his clothes and taking him under the moonlight. A year passed after that, then another. They'd walk into one another's hotel rooms late at night during a mission, or call the other to meet in one (usually the Major). The most intimate thing they'd shared were kisses, and not much more than that. Dorian had not as much as seen the Major in the nude, for the act of removing his clothes would make him tense and back away. He'd cut off contact with all of the other men he'd been seeing until only the Major remained, and he grew impatient.

How could a man light his body on fire the way that the Major did, but be so cold he'd nearly left him in tears? He had never as much as said a single soft word towards Dorian, a term of endearment, nothing. His love language was purely physical, for better or worse — he'd be completely silent after they were finished, but would hold Eroica so tightly against him, Dorian feared he would break. Of course, it was a mutual agreement. But it only lasted so long, until the Major's cold shoulder left Dorian feeling dirty, as if he'd been used, pretending he didn't exist to him outside of the realm of a bedroom, leaving while Dorian was still asleep, never saying goodbye. He once did the same to the officer — left his hotel room while the Major was still in the bathroom. But, not only did he not feel any change, he felt disgusted with himself afterwards, as if he'd taken advantage of someone. He let the Major know that, in their next encounter, and apologized.

“I'm a man”, the officer said. “Who cares if you kissed me goodbye on the cheek or not?”

Now, Iron Klaus was all over him again, wrapping his hands around his waist, pressing his face against his hair, against the nape of his neck, and Dorian could feel his breathing on his bare skin, under his coat. The Earl turned to face him, taking him in a kiss, embracing him, tightly, so tightly.

“Major”, he whispered. “I want you.”

He felt the officer hum against his skin, the vibration from his deep voice sending goosebumps up Dorian's spine, making him blush. “I want you… I want you… Hold me, hold me tight, don't let me go, don't…”

Suddenly, the Major took a small step back, his hands still on Dorian, but his eyes fixed on him, tense and wary as before. “What is it?”

The Earl, flustered, his coat sleeve halfway down his arm, was speechless, overwhelmed, overstimulated. How could he tell? He wondered, yet, he realized the answer to his own question immediately. He could know me by touch alone, know what I felt just from looking at me. He put his hands to the officer's chest, opening his mouth to speak, only for it to hang open for a few seconds before he knew what to say, in shy hesitation.

“Be my lover.”

The man widened his eyes. Dorian could almost read his thoughts — though the Major was a convincing actor at his work, when they were alone, his expressions would always betray him. “What?”

“I want to be yours. And I want you to be mine. I could be so good to you… So good, if only you'd let me.”

The Major pursed his lips, raising an eyebrow. “And what makes that any different from the way we are now?”

“Oh, everything, Major… I…” His hands balled into fists as he bit his lip, looking down. It was hard to speak. He felt his face burn with shame. He was so open, so vulnerable, to a man who treated those things like mortal sin. He raised his face to him again. “I could give you so much. Not just my body, but my mind, my heart… I could be your companion, the one who is there for you when you are alone, the one who aids you when you're sick…”

“You make it sound like a burden.”

“Not to me”, Lord Gloria shook his head. “Not if it is you.”

“And if I say no?”

For a second, he did not answer.

“I will turn back, call my men, and take the first plane back to England. And you will never see or hear of Eroica ever again.”

“And if I say yes, but lie?”

Dorian couldn't help but smile. Iron Klaus snorted.

“You are as petty and vengeful as the devil himself”, the Major said. “You will find me, and make sure your revenge is ten times worse.”

“You do know me so well.”

He saw, to his surprise, the corners of the Major's lips curl upwards in a warm smile, the type one would give to an old friend. It lasted only a second. The officer looked down, his face returning to its usual scowl.

“Well?” Dorian asked, full of hope.

“I think you know my answer.”

“And that is?”

“You’re delirious.”

“No”, Dorian replied, stern. “Don't call me names. You wound me.”

“I'm not. You are delirious”, the officer rasped. “It's impossible in every way imaginable.”

“Do you think you're the only man I've been in a secret relationship with?” He asked. “The only officer I've been in a relationship with?”

“I'm not a sailor who walks around parks at night, looking for men. I'm a high-ranking officer of…”

“So was the General who wanted me to live with him when I was twenty-one. Christ, Klaus, what year do you think this is? 1942? Do you think you're the only gay man in NATO? Hell, in intelligence?”

“Enough!” The Major roared, his voice vibrating with rage. “I’m not fucking gay!” Dorian flinched, taking a step back.

Major Eberbach sighed, dragging his large hands down his face. He took off his coat without saying a word, hanging it on a nearby chair as he sat on his bed. He mumbled a curse in German as he reached for his nightstand, and quickly lit a cigarette, the clicking of the lighter being the only sound in the room, other than the Major's labored breathing.

Why does he lie to himself so?

The Earl watched him, tense, his hands balled into fists, watching the smoke rise in the air.

“Am I a machine to you?” Dorian asked. “A cold, unfeeling thing that does what its programmed to do over and over? Because I am not. I am flesh and bone, Major. I feel… I crave, I love, I ache. and I cannot betray my own feelings. I cannot betray my heart… And that is how I feel.”

The light in the bedroom was faint. The Major always had his windows closed, and only the bedside lamp prevented them from being in total darkness. Warm-colored lights and shadows danced across the Major's face, his heavy knitted eyebrows and his dark hair. A minute passed, then two, and there they stood in silence, until the cigarette was burnt to the filter, and the Major silently put it out on his ashtray.

He couldn't handle it anymore.

Lord Gloria fixed his coat. “I'm going”, he said. He did not specify if it was his hotel room, or the first plane back to England. He didn't think he owed him an explanation.

In two large strides, the Major reached him, holding him by the arm. Dorian froze in place. He felt the tears come, and this time, he did not stop them.

“Look at me”, the Major said.

He could not. He could not move, nor speak. It was as if his body became stone, slowly hunching over, as if bending within itself. He could not look at him now, it was about the hardest thing he could do.

“I feel so pathetic”, Dorian sobbed. “But I can't do this anymore, Major. I can't.”

“Don’t speak.” The Major ordered. His voice was calm, despite the imperative way he spoke. His deep baritone almost soothed him.

With his eyes still shut, Lord Gloria suddenly felt strong hands around him, bringing them closer — and then, he had his face on the Major's neck, and his hands slowly reaching for his back.

“You cry too much”, the officer said.

“After tonight, you won't have to see me cry ever again.”

“Stop saying nonsense.”

The Earl snorted. “What nonsense?”

“I won't let you go that easily.”

“I am not yours for you to tell me what to do”, Dorian pulled back, scowling. “I will call my men, take the first plane back to England, and…”

“No, you won't.”

The Earl's face burnt with anger. “I've told you, I am not a machine. I don't appreciate having my feelings mocked, especially when I am at my most honest and vulnerable.”

“I’m not mocking you.”

Eroica furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. “What?”

“I am not mocking you”, the officer repeated.

 “Are you being serious?”

“You know the answer to that.”

“No!” Dorian protested. “No riddles, no hidden words. I want to hear it from your lips. Tell me if you are serious or not. Tell me you want me to be yours, Major. Tell me you'll be mine…”

“Scheiße, you are as dramatic as…” The Major clicked his tongue. “Verdammt, Ich…” He looked left and right — there was a brief moment where he seemed to reconsider his next word. Eons seemed to come and go in the silence of the hotel room. He looked Dorian in the eyes. It was something that he never did, with Dorian, or with anybody.

“Ja. Yes.”

Lord Gloria stood still in the room, the silence consuming him.

It was the Major who leaned forward, kissing him, tears and all, holding Dorian by the back of his head. The officer tilted his head, deepening the kiss, and the Earl held onto him for dear life.

It was the Major who began it, and the Major who ended it. He drew away from the Earl. “Is that enough for you?”

“Did you mean it?” Dorian asked, his voice faint.

“I do not like repeating myself.” The Major's thumb wiped a tear off his cheek. Dorian leaned against his hand.

“Do it for me.”

He sighed. “I do. Is that enough for you?” The Major was impatient as always, but there was warmth in his voice.

“Yes”, Dorian said. “A million times, yes.”

Klaus scoffed. “Fool”, he said. But he could hear the smile in his voice.

***

Lord Gloria's most prized possession was in the plainest room of his castle. It was a room he often forgot about — no rich ornate tapestries, no marble busts of a century past. When he and his sisters all lived together, it had been their playroom. Once his mother left, his dad decided to turn it into a study. “You're a young man now, Dorian”, he told his twelve-year-old self. “You don't play with toys anymore, do you?”

It was the room his mother would send him away to whenever she was plagued by her many headaches. He'd play with Lizzie, two years his senior, sometimes even with Jane, while a nanny looked after them. Cathy, already an adult by that point, spent most of her days away. Back then, the room was livelier, with a warm yellow carpet contrasting with the dark green walls. There was a child-sized easel they would use to paint, and a dollhouse that had once belonged to his mother. Dorian had boys’ toys, of course — cars, guns, a Pinocchio. But he spent most of his time with Lizzie at the dollhouse, where he always played with the girl dolls, rather than the boy dolls. Dorian had kept the dollhouse. It was still in that room. His father had sold all of their other toys, but Dorian insisted, cried to let him keep it. It smelled of rat poison and humidity now.

The Young Shepherd by Giorgione was the only painting on the walls of that room. A young man demurely looks down, with pale skin and pale hair, against a dark background. Shirtless, his ornament being a band tied on his hair. Until 1877, it was not known to be a painting by the Italian master — the bottom of the painting had been cut off, removing his signature. It had been his grandfather's close friend that had made the discovery: An art historian named Leopold Price. His grandfather, always fond of collectibles, had kept a newspaper clipping of the incident in one of his scrapbooks. But Dorian would never know where it was. Castle Gloria was grand, enormous, and old. It remained in Leopold’s collection, and then passed down to his son, Edward, a man that had been his father's close friend. It then passed to Edward's son, who sold it at auction to a man named Saleem Al Sabaah, only for the man to have the painting stolen by the phantom thief Eroica.

Dorian could not recall the first time he laid his eyes on the Shepherd. It had always been a part of his life, like the rose orchards of the Castle and the brown rabbits of the gardens. He could recall his father lifting him onto his shoulders so he could see the Shepherd better, but that had been it. Otherwise, the Shepherd had been in his life longer than anybody else — longer than Mr. Davies, Ravi, Bonham, certainly the Major. When the painting first came into his hands after fifteen long years, he placed it in his room, above his bed, only to quickly take it off. He felt as if he were being watched.

So, now, there it was: a statement to his accomplishments as a thief, a reminder of his humble beginnings, collecting dust in a room even the servants would forget about, a room filled with memories, ghosts, dusted objects hidden underneath a plastic covering. Sometimes, Dorian would remember its existence. I must change its place, he would tell himself, but the change never came. Days turned into a week, weeks turned into months, and months turned into years.

“What have you done with the Price collection?” Asked the man in the bowler hat. His name was Carl — but he insisted on only being referred to as the man in the bowler hat. He was about a head shorter than Dorian, his thick moustache starting to grey. They sat on a bench in Hyde Park, Dorian at one end and the man at the other when he brought it up.

“What?” Eroica asked, despite having heard him clearly. He looked up from the book he pretended to read.

“Don't look at me, lad. The Price Collection. Remember? Edward Price, your late father's late friend. Your first heist.”

“We needn't dwell into those unpleasant things”, Dorian sighed. “I kept some of it, but sold most of it.”

“Giorgione's Young Shepherd?”

“I kept him.”

The man in the bowler hat never lifted his gaze from his newspaper. “I see.”

“Is this interrogation over?”

“There was no interrogation, lad. I was curious. Do you still remember it? Your first heist? You were… Sixteen? Seventeen?”

“Fourteen. And yes, I remember.”

“I remember it, too.” The man in the bowler hat smiled fondly. “It was a decision that was… Well, you were young. Very young.”

“Foolish.”

“You're too hard on yourself. It was daring, is what it was. If it wasn't for the bloody dogs, you'd have gotten the painting from Price. You said he'd tricked you, right? Said he'd give it to you, but then didn't.”

“Yes.” Dorian swallowed dryly. He was never one to be monosyllabic. Maybe I've been spending too much time with the Major, he thought. He shifted uncomfortably with his seat.

“A sore spot. I apologize. I won't touch on it again.”

“It's fine.”

The rest of the conversation was unremarkable. Carl disclosed the locations of some ancient Roman busts that had been loaned by the Louvre, the Earl gave the man some paintings he asked for, and they parted ways.

“Every'hin alrigh'?, m’lord?” Bonham asked as Dorian entered the Ferrari, sitting on the passenger seat.

But the Earl doesn't reply. He stays silent, looking down at his palms, his skin white from clenching his fists so tightly.

“M'lord?” Bonham asked again. He put his chubby hand on the Earl's arm, and quickly noticed the redness of his eyes, as tears started to burn on them. He undid his belt, scooting closer to Dorian on the middle seat. “Blimey, m'lord! Wha’ ‘appened?”

But the Earl had no words for him, as he began to sob, looking down in shame as Bonham pushed his locks back, away from his face, as Bonham let him bury his face on his shoulder and cry.

“S'alright, Dorian”, Bonham said, running his fingers through the Earl's hair. He felt like a child, crying on Bonham's shoulder like this. But the longer he was held, the more he didn't want to be let go of. “S’alright.”

It was late into the night when he picked up his phone, as he sat at the edge of his bed, dialing an international call to the NATO Intelligence office in Bonn, Germany. Despite the late hour, a gut feeling told him he should call that, as he did not have the Major's home phone number.

He picked up on the third dial. “Eberbach. Wer ist das?”

Dorian smiled when he heard that voice. “It's me.”

“Oh, ja. Why are you calling the office at this hour?”

“Why are you in the office at this hour?”

“Because that's what having a job is like. Not that you'd know.”

“I wouldn't”, Dorian giggled. “But that doesn't sound right…”

“Ja, ja. You haven't answered me. What is it?”

“I miss you.”

“That does not seem like enough of a reason to pay for an international call.”

“It is, to me. I wish you were here. I wish I knew when I would see you again.”

He heard the Major sigh. There was a pause — taking a drag of a cigarette, Dorian assumed. He'd always do it when he became uncomfortable in a conversation. Despite being a literal sea away, he felt as if the Major were right there with him.

“Nothing's stopping you from boarding a plane.”

“Have you met my accountant?” Lord Gloria giggled again.

“Ach, ja.”

“It would be easier if you came to me, you know.”

“Ja, ja. I'll find a way.” Another pause. Another drag, he assumed. He heard the sound of his breathing, as if he were blowing on something. “Can I go now?”

Dorian laughed. “Of course you can. You always find a way, don't you, darling?”

“It’s my job.”

“... Especially when it comes to me.”

Silence.

“Alright, you fucking bastard. Go to sleep. I'll check my schedule.”

There it was, the Earl thought. The silence near frightened him. He didn't like the Major when he was silent. He liked him vocal, complaining, rambling, be it about the beauty of polished steel or the machinations of cars he'd never heard of.

“I'll wait for you, darling.”

“You're happy now, ja?”

“Very. I'll show you our rose orchard, my art collection. The one here, anyway.”

“Then, goodbye.”

“Goodbye, my love.” He made a small kissing sound. He waited a second before he heard the Major — flustered, livid, he assumed — complaining in his mother tongue. Then, he hung up. He found it easier to sleep like that, and he dreamed of his rose orchards, of walking hand in hand with the Major through them. The officer seemed, for the first time, at peace.

He woke earlier than expected the next morning — it was summer, and the sun had risen earlier. He hadn’t even needed James to wake him. The first thing he’d done was go into the old study where his childhood dollhouse had been. He picked up Giorgione’s Young Shepherd from one of the walls, and placed it at the center of his picture gallery, letting sunrays kiss the Shepherd’s cheeks once more.