And Sofia did indeed pretend she was a Satanist. Watching them both, Lucas learned that she and Damien had something of a competition: who could cause the most chaos at a family event. The Satanism was a good start, got her a few stern words and horrified looks from the elderly, but it also took her out of the game; leaving Lucas and Damien as she was dragged away by some great aunt to apologise to the picture of the Virgin Mary. That left Damien time to cut on a conversation Tía Josephine had dragged Mateo into, informing her that no, Mateo didn't have a girlfriend, but was having an illicit affair with the pastor's wife.
"See, Mateo?" Damien said, returning his brother's look of furious surprise with a sweet, innocent smile. Well, as innocent as Damien could get. "I told you she wouldn't be angry. Now, tía, you can't tell anyone. Isn't it romantic?"
By then, Lucas decided it was best to drag him away, before Mateo beat him to death with his cane or Josephine strangled the pair of them. As he pulled Damien away, he could hear Josephine screeching something in Spanish, and Mateo hurriedly trying to explain.
"The only problem with that plan, Damien, would be that it required her to believe you were a romantic." Lucas informed him as they walked to the other side of the room, as far from Josephine's wrath as possible. "And I can't imagine anyone would believe that."
"I don't know." Damien said, glancing down to meet Lucas' eyes, wearing that stupid, teasing little smile. "Maybe I've had a change of heart, tesoro."
"Right. And maybe Hell will freeze over." Lucas said, without thinking.
And for a moment the kiss was there, hanging in the air between them.
But Damien raised a hand to clutch his heart, dramatic as ever, and the moment passed.
"You wound me."
"I don't, but I'm pretty sure Mateo will."
And indeed, Mateo had somehow escaped Josephine's rage, and was stalking across the room to where they stood, looking decidedly unhappy. But luckily for Lucas and Damien, Maria called them all to dinner before Mateo could make good on any of the threats he was miming at Damien.
They all sat down, too many chairs crammed around a dining table that groaned under the weight of food Maria and their family had piled atop it. Plates heaped with steaming empanadas, grilled ribs beside a green, herb-looking sauce, thick slices of cheese seasoned with red pepper flakes and grilled beside bread, served with olives. And, in pride of place at the centre of the table, the cake.
Sofia and Damien's game didn't stop at dinner. Sofia tried to eat with her fingers, which earned her a smack across the back of the head from Maria. When Gabriel tried to copy her, shovelling a rib into his mouth with sticky fingers, Damien's grandmother went on a rant in Spanish.
"...when I was a girl, my father wouldn't have let me eat if my manners had been as bad as that. You kids, you have no respect." Damien translated, doing a surprising passable impression of an old, very angry Argentinian woman.
Across the table, Sofia looked proudly at the chaos she'd caused, and then turned her gaze to Damien. She raised an eyebrow, a clear challenge. Damien just smiled.
And then, just as Lucas took a bite of an empanada, Damien leaned down to whisper in his ear.
"You reckon anyone would notice if I gave you a handjob under the table?"
Lucas choked. He tried to swallow, and breathe, and say something all at once but just ended up spluttering, trying to catch his breath with the pastry stuck in his throat. His face went bright red, eyes watering, as several relatives hurried to give him a glass of water and thump him on the back.
"I'm fine, I'm fine." He managed to croak, holding up a hand before somebody tried the Heimlich manoeuvre.
Damien and Sofia roared with laughter, evidently both very pleased with themselves. Though Damien shut up pretty quickly when Lucas glared at him through still-watering eyes, and laughed out an apology when he elbowed him sharply in the side.
"I hate you." Lucas muttered, gulping in air before taking another bite of empanada.
"No you don't. C'mon, you considered it."
"I did not."
***
"Sofia asked me what I said to make you choke, you know." Damien remarked, as they walked together down the darkened streets, waving goodbye to the family that had gathered on the porch to say goodbye to Lucas.
"You didn't tell her, did you?" Lucas asked, horrified.
Damien scoffed. "As if. I told her I said you were going to fail your SATs, or something."
"Asshole." Lucas said, though by now it was more of a term of endearment.
Maria had insisted that Damien walk Lucas home, especially at such a late hour. The night was warm, Lucas was full of food, and he could just about make out the fading laughter and chatter of the house. He felt content, so happy and comfortable he found he was smiling to himself as he walked beside Damien. Every so often, Damien's knuckles brushed the back of his hand. Something had changed, he realised. There was some new, strange feeling in his chest, almost as if he could feel the weight of his own heart. It was big, and heavy, and every time Damien smiled he swore he could feel it ache. He didn't know what was wrong with him.
And whenever Lucas was faced with an unknown, he tried to figure it out. Which meant they had to talk about the kiss. Lucas liked things to be clear and simple, and two friends making out and then never speaking about it again was confusing and difficult. He needed to find out what it meant, and what he wanted, and what Damien was feeling. He looked up at him, streaks of moonlight caught in Damien's ink-black hair, the sharp line of shadow under his jaw and those dark, dark eyes. Lucas had no idea what he was thinking, and he didn't like not knowing things.
"So," He began, unsure where to begin, but Damien got there first.
"Why'd you kiss me?" He asked, and for a moment when he looked at Lucas he seemed almost confused, unsure, as if he really couldn't imagine why. "I'm definitely not complaining, but I really didn't see that one coming. Didn't think you'd have the balls, honestly."
"You're too kind." Lucas responded sarcastically, stalling for time. He frowned a little, thinking back to that moment. Why had he kissed Damien? He couldn't deny that he was attracted to Damien: Damien looked like that, after all, and Lucas was gay and had a working pair of eyes (well, when he wore his glasses). But it hadn't just been the fact Damien was hot. There'd been something else, some big, overwhelming feeling, when Damien took care of his siblings and gave him his favourite shirt and said he was stupid but sounded like he meant the exact opposite.
"I don't know." He began slowly. "I like how you are there. I like how you are when no one else is looking, or when you're with your siblings, or when it's just us. You're funny, and you say stupid things, and you're sweet even though you pretend not to be, and..." Rambling, again. Always rambling. Damien had a nasty habit of making Lucas say exactly what he meant. "...and sometimes you look at me in this way that makes me feel..." He couldn't put it into words, the feeling. It made him feel flustered and important and dizzyingly, giddily happy. "...I don't know. Something. And so I kissed you. Because I wanted to, I think." Because I wanted you.
"You think?" Damien asked, after a beat of silence. He had his hands in his pockets, expression unreadable.
"Well, yes. I think. It's all very confusing, you see. Because when you're around your family, or when we're alone I like you a lot, but you're not always like that. When you're with your friends, or right when I first met you, you were a little awful, actually. It's like there's two versions of you, or there's an act you put up, where you can be obnoxious and loud and rude and mean, and I can't work out how I feel because I don't think you can work out who you are." He took a deep breath, trying to stop the words pouring out. "I want to talk about it. So I can figure it out."
"Do we have to talk about it?" Damien asked, and although Lucas couldn't make out his face in the dark, he could hear that he sounded apprehensive, almost worried.
"Yes." Lucas said firmly. "I'm not like you, Damien. I don't go around kissing anyone who'll look at me twice. These things actually mean something to me."
Silence, again. It went on too long, Lucas had the distinct impression he'd said something wrong, and when he looked up at Damien he could've sworn he looked hurt. But then some sort of wall went up, and the expression melted away, replaced by blank nonchalance. "Right. I forgot, I'll just hook up with anyone. It won't mean anything to me, so you can just do whatever you'd like."
Lucas felt that the tone had shifted, just slightly. "Well, isn't that sort of what you do? You hit on practically everyone, and people say—"
"Christ, Lucas. You seriously thought you could just make out with me and then work out what it meant later? Because if I'll kiss anyone, it doesn't matter how I feel?"
"No, Damien, it's not like that." Lucas shook his head, trying to phrase it correctly. "You don't get it."
"Really? Because it sounds like you have no idea how you feel, so you thought you'd experiment with me and then figure out if you wanted to reject me or not later." His words were bitter, almost angry.
"That's not fair." Lucas wasn't entirely sure how the situation had gotten out of control so quickly. It wasn't his fault Damien had overreacted, when Lucas really just wanted to have a regular conversation. "It's not my fault you make it so difficult."
"Oh, I'm the one making it difficult? You're the one who can't make up your damn mind about this. One minute you're saying we need to be friends, that you're not looking to date and aren't interested in me, and then the next minute you're kissing me? How am I supposed to feel about that, Lucas? You're playing with me."
"I'm not, I'm just confused." Lucas said, trying and failing to find the words to articulate what he meant. He liked Damien, liked him so much it almost hurt, but he didn't like the way he changed, sometimes. That Damien in the coffee shop, in front of his friends, was worlds away from the Damien he'd seen that night. Even on the cliff, there'd been something slightly off about him. But maybe Lucas didn't know anything at all. "And it's not like you changing around your friends makes that any easier."
"I tried to fix that." Damien said, exasperated. "I wanted to change, to make everything better, because I could see that it hurt you. When you said you weren't interested, I accepted it. I thought if I could at least have this, be your friend, I'd be happy. And then you kissed me, and now you're telling me you're confused." He sounded disgusted, as if that final word tasted sour on his tongue.
"Aren't you also confused? Isn't this just a bit of fun to you?" Lucas asked wildly, because he had no idea how Damien felt. He flirted with everyone, was never serious about anything, how was Lucas supposed to know what he meant?
Damien scoffed derisively, though there was no humour behind it. "I know exactly how I feel. I can't even hide it. Everyone who fucking looks at us can tell. Everyone except you. I don't know if you're really that stupid, Lucas, or if you're just ignoring it because it makes things more difficult for you. I think if you were looking for it, if you wanted me to feel the same, you'd have figured it out. But you haven't. Because you're confused."
"There's nothing wrong with not knowing how you're feeling." Lucas answered. Emotions very tricky, and messy and never followed an orderly pattern.
"No, but you can't tell a guy you're not interested and then kiss him like it meant something and then tell him that no, you're just confused and trying to figure out if you like him or not. I thought you kissed me because you...fuck, I was stupid."
A lot of things were clicking into place all at once. They came to a stop outside Lucas' front gate. Damien wouldn't meet his eyes. Lucas was speechless, trying to grapple with the complex mess of feelings before him, unsure what to say. He was never good at this, at all this feelings stuff.
"Damien, I'm sorry. I didn't know—"
Damien laughed. It was sharp, brittle, as if it would break at any moment. "Of course you didn't know. Probably didn't fit nicely into one of your stupid plans, right?" He turned his back to Lucas, and began to walk back the way he'd come. "Whatever. I'm sure you'll figure it out soon. And if you don't," Damien glanced over his shoulder. He was smiling, but it was a cold smile. "you can always find someone else. Someone you actually know you like."
And he was gone, leaving Lucas standing out the front of his own house, with a hollow, empty feeling in his chest. What had just happened? How had he lost control so quickly? He hurried inside, so he wouldn't keep staring at the space where Damien had stood.
Mark looked up as he stepped into the living room. "Lucas, where've you..." His eyes widened as they fell on Lucas' face. "You're crying."
Lucas reached up, almost numb, to touch his cheek. His fingers came away wet. Oh god, I'm crying. He sniffed, reaching up to try and clumsily wipe them away. Mark stood up, and before Lucas could protest that he was fine, he was being hugged.
"What are you—"
"Shhh..." Mark said, reaching down to awkwardly pat the top of his head. "This is happening."
This sent Lucas over the edge. Before he knew it, he was crying into the front of Mark's running hoodie. It smelt like sweat, which was a little gross, but he didn't care. Everything just poured out, confusion and hurt and the knowledge that he'd screwed this up somehow, something that had made him so happy.
"So, should I go and punch him now, or are we going to keep hugging?"