"Hey," Roman said softly when he opened the door for me. He reached out and ran his thumb over the eyeliner on my left eye. He didn't say anything about it, but I knew he liked it. "Sorry about this. I tried telling my parents that it was too soon to meet you, but actually it was my dad that refused to do this another time so..."
Great. Roman's dad was already kind of intimidating as it was and now, he was very adamant to meet me properly? What was I in for?
"That's okay. I guess I would have had to meet them at some point so..." I mean I slightly hoped that Roman would just sneak me into his house for a while so I wouldn't have to meet his parents until it had been a little while longer, but here we are.
"Alright, c'mon." He grabbed my hand, interlocking our fingers, and brought me inside where his mum had just finished laying the table. His dad was helping her, and Genie was nowhere to be seen. "Genie's gone to spend the night at our Gran's house," Roman explained without me having to ask. Dammit. She was the one family member I knew for sure liked me.
"Hi Alden," Sofia said coming over to greet me. I made sure to return the greeting before I briefly glanced at Roman's dad, whose name I still didn't know. He'd already taken a seat at the head of the table. "Come sit."
Roman, with our hands still interlocked, guided me into a seat beside him while his mum sat opposite us both. His father was sat in between Roman and his mum and was staring quite intently at me.
"H...hi Mr Kingsley," I said hoping he wouldn't think me to be impolite for having not greeted him yet.
"Oh honey, just call him Romeo," Sofia said. At least now I knew his name.
"Oh, is Roman named after you Romeo?" I asked trying to seem as cordial as possible.
"Yes, he is, but if you don't mind, I'd actually prefer Mr Kingsley for now," he said rather bluntly. "We are still strangers after all."
"Dad!" Roman said at the same time that Sofia called her husband by his name.
"It...it's okay, I understand," I said completely not understanding at all. Romeo definitely hated me, that was clear, but why?
I'd asked Roman before coming over when he'd told his parents about being bi. He told me he let them know the day after coming out to his friends at that party and that they'd been accepting of his sexualty despite the shock. Apparently, they didn't even have a clue, but I don't think even Roman did for a long time, so that's understandable.
But maybe, his dad wasn't as accepting as Roman thought he was? Or maybe Romeo accepted his son being bi but still expected him to bring home girls so he wouldn't have to deal with his son's sexuality. Boyfriend or not, bringing me home probably wasn't doing much in terms of keeping the old image of his son at the forefront of his mind. Not that Roman's even changed much. At least I didn't think he had but I guess I didn't really know him before so I can't be certain.
"It's nice though, Roman...Romeo," I said starting my nervous mumbling. "It suits you both... umm yeah it's nice. How come you didn't name your first born after you? Wait maybe that's rude... sorry." I am so fucked.
Sofia just laughed it off as she started plating up our food for us all encouraging us to sit and let her do it for us.
"It's because Lorenzo's birth was a piece of cake, but when it came to this one," Sofia said pointing at Roman as she sat back down. "25 hours of labour and a lot of health complications later, the doctor told us he was healthy and perfect but that I might never be able to give birth again. We thought he would be our last child, so I thought to name him after his dad."
"Genie's a total miracle baby," Roman added. "Also why it took 16 years after me to have her, and not onlybecause I was a problem child."
Sofia scoffed. "A problem child? Alden he was a demon."
"Mum! You're not meant to say stuff like that. Not to my face anyway."
"Oh whatever. I still loved you regardless, and look how perfect you are now," Sofia cooed. I wonder if my mum would have talked about me in the same way. She wouldn't have complained about me being a problem child because I know I never was, but I wonder how she would have talked about me of I brought a partner home one day.
"Stop, you'll embarrass me."
"If he really likes you, a little embarrassment shouldn't stop him from liking you," Mr Kingsley said speaking again at last. "Right Alden?"
"Right." I nodded immediately. "I...I like Roman."
Roman reached over and squeezed my hand under the table with his right hand. It only lasted for a moment because he needed his hand back to eat, but it felt nice and reassuring. Calming.
We continued to talk with some friendly chatter for a little while, mostly Roman and Sofia making conversation with me. Romeo would make blunt remarks here and there. I felt like he was testing me, and I also feel like I was failing somehow.
But I tried to do what I'd been told. I complimented both of Roman's parents, told Sofia that her food was lovely, and sung praises to the way they had raised Roman for him having turned into such a kind, caring, and funny person. I tried to engage in the conversation as best as I could and think about what I said before I said it, so I wasn't just nervously rambling on about things that didn't need to be said. And I made absolutely no mention at all to any sort of thing that his parents do not need to know, like how my foster sister had let me borrow some makeup so that I could cover up all the hickies their son had left on my neck.
"Let me ask you something Alden," Roman's father said. This would have been the first question he actually asked me himself and I was terrified. I gulped and nodded nervously for him to ask whatever he wanted to say. "How does someone get a scar like that? Hmm?"
My scar?
I didn't think he or Sofia would actually ask me about it so I didn't have any sort of answer prepared except the truth which I hadn't even told Roman yet. I could feel the mark throbbing now at the memories. My mother's face as she called out to me in fear when I fell to the ground bleeding out before her. The way my father collapsed right in front of my eyes, inches away from where I lay, bleeding out and dying while I still lay alive and in pain and in too much shock to cry. The way my mother's screams were silenced as the life was bled out of her too.
"Dad!" Roman shouted sounding angrier this time than the other times his father had something to say. Everything sounded a bit muffled though, like I wasn't hearing things clearly anymore. My hands felt dry. Dry from all the times I used to wash them obsessively in the first year after their death because I could always feel the residue left behind from where my father's pool of blood grew so large that my unmoving hand was drenched in the stuff. "You can't ask him that!"
"Why not? I just want to know how a kid his age gets a serious scar like that. Was it from a fight Alden?"
"Romeo, stop. He doesn't even look like someone who would get in a fight," Sofia said trying to placate her husband. I was grateful that by now the bruises from when Henry attacked me had long disappeared, and though there was a slight ache every now and then in my ribs, they had mostly healed too. God only knows what Romeo would have thought if I'd shown up with a black eye and hunched back from chest pain.
"Well, he still hasn't answered my question," Mr Kingsley said.
"And he doesn't need to," Roman argued. "You don't need to tell him anything," he said turning to me before he turned back to his father. "What are you doing dad? You would never have treated him the way you have tonight if he was a girl."
"Girls are different Roman."
"Only because you treated them differently," Roman said raising his voice.
"Please," I said quietly. "Please don't fight." I didn't want to cause any rifts between them, and maybe it was about time I told Roman what had happened anyway. God my hands were so dry. My throat felt sore. "I was 12. There was a burglar who broke into our house because my dad had to fire him at work after a promotion. He wanted money and anything else expensive that we had so he grabbed me and held me at knife point but when he realised my father had his phone hidden behind his back he freaked out and slit my throat. Then he killed my parents when they tried to get to me."
"Oh My God, Alden," Sofia said shocked.
"My dad had dialed 999 and put them on speaker behind his back, so they sent out an ambulance and police. They managed to catch the guy before he got away. He'd been careless with me. The cut wasn't deep enough so they managed to stop the bleeding but yeah, my parents...he wasn't so careless with them. I went into care after that and I'm living with some foster parents at the moment."
I wasn't really looking at anyone when I told them the story as I let it just spill out of me. Of course, it was very abbreviated. I didn't tell them about how someone was coming in to get the security cameras fitted to the house wired properly the next day and how if the burglar had come even a day later, we would have been alerted before he ever got inside the house. I didn't tell them about how I spent every waking moment for months wondering what I could have done differently even though I was only 12 years old which means there was probably very little I could have done in reality. I didn't tell them about all the occasions in which I wish I had just died along with them.
"Are you happy now dad?" Roman asked. He didn't give his father much time to answer though because soon he was taking my hand and pulling me away from the table and toward his room.
As he pulled me away, I heard his parents talking quietly behind us. "I know, I'll apologise," I think Mr Kingsley said. Though he didn't follow us upstairs.
Roman hugged me in the confines of his room before he said anything. Just held me against his body for what felt like hours but was probably only a few seconds. I didn't know what to do with my hands until I finally figured out that I could wrap them around his waist. He squeezed me tighter in response and whispered a sorry into my ear.
"I didn't know that he was going to be so rude. I mean, I knew that he was struggling a bit with accepting that I was bi, but he said he still loved me, so I didn't think he would act that way if I brought a guy home. He's never been like that before. I'll talk to him okay," Roman said.
"It's okay."
"It's not," Roman whispered. "It's not okay that happened to you. To your parents, I mean. That's...I'm just so sorry babe."
"It feels like forever ago now, but it's just hard sometimes. I'm mostly okay though. I feel like the last few weeks are the happiest I've ever been. I feel like there's so many more people who care about me now. You included."
I didn't like talking or even thinking about my parents, but as devastating as it could be when I did, it felt like I had an actual support system now. I didn't just have to rely on myself anymore.
"I'm glad," Roman said. "Am I allowed to kiss you right now?"
"You don't need to ask. You're always allowed."
"Sometimes I'll still ask though." And then he was kissing me.
It was only his lips pressed against mine for a few seconds, but it was enough to make things awkward when Roman's father knocked on the door and opened it without waiting for an answer which didn't give us enough time to pull away before he saw.
"Uhh...sorry," Mr Kingsley said looking more sheepish than I had ever seen him. "I didn't mean to uhh interrupt. I just came to apologise if that's okay."
"Go on then," Roman said quite harshly. I knew he was mad, but I still don't think I could talk to my parents like that if they were still around.
"Right... well I want to apologise to both of you actually, but I'll start with you Alden." Mr Kingsley was still stood by the open door and didn't dare come any closer. I didn't know where Sofia was, perhaps still downstairs.
"I have no problem with Roman being bisexual. I need both of you to know that, but I just know how boys can be. I used to be one. I tried to raise my own boys to be better men; tried to learn from my mistakes and tell them which of those mistakes they shouldn't make. I never thought I'd have to deal with other boys until Genie was born, and then Roman tells me he's bi, then tells me he's seeing someone, evidently a boy, and suddenly that boy is in my home and all I can think about is the way I treated the people I dated before Sofia. I just wanted to protect my son but in doing that I hurt you. For that I'm sorry."
"I understand, Mr Kingsley" I said now knowing at least why he had been so cold with me. I knew how boys could be too. I knew how boys, who never grew out of being a boy but still called themselves a man, could be. I'd been hurt and used by enough to know. And I could say without a doubt that if I had kids one day, I would be terrified of them making the same mistake I did as well. "It's okay."
"Thank you, Alden, but please call me Romeo." Maybe he wasn't so bad after all? "And Roman," Mr Kingsley said turning to his son now. "I'm sorry to you too. You're right, I did treat your girlfriends differently. And if I treated you differently too, I'm sorry. You being bi doesn't mean I've lost any love for you, there's just...there's just more fear now. I know you can take care of yourself but sometimes I can't help but imagine you walking down the street hand in hand with a boy, which you have every right to do, but then you never coming home because someone saw you holding hands and decided they didn't like it.
"You think Genie's our miracle baby, but really it's you. I know it was your mum who had to go through all that pain, but I was the one sat there helpless full of fear during your birth. Fear that I was going to lose you, maybe even both of you. I haven't been doing well with that fear coming back full force. I love all my children equally, but you have my name, you look the most like me unlike Lorenzo and Genie, and in you I see the person I wish I could have been most, when I was your age. So, I feel a lot of fear and that's clouded how I've been treating you as of late and, truly, I'm sorry."
Is that how my parents felt too? They never made a big deal out of the possibility that I liked boys but there weren't a lot of times where it was talked about as I'd still been so young, so boyfriends probably wouldn't have been a concern for them for a couple more years at least. But I wonder if they had this fear too. I wonder if they tried to act like it was no big deal while lying awake at night wondering if there would be a day where their only child never came home because someone didn't like that he held hands with another boy.
"Dad...I why didn't you ever say anything before?" Roman asked. I could tell he felt a little taken aback by what his dad had said.
"Because I'm not good with sharing my feelings," Mr Kingsley said. "That's why I never told you off for all your tantrums as a kid. I wanted you to have an outlet for all your feelings but not feel like you had to keep them in all the time."
Me Kingsley was kind of an amazing father. I bet he and my dad would have gotten along. He and Mike definitely will.
"Love you dad. I forgive you," Roman said smiling before he went over and gave his dad a very brief hug.
"Love you too kid. Always."
And then they did something that made me freeze in my spot. It was a simple thing just their foreheads touching for barely a second, but my father used to do the same for me. Would he have specifically had more fear than even my mother because I was his son? I didn't look as much like him as I did my mother, having inherited her curls and the ginger hue of my locks as well as the green eyes, nor did I have my father's name. But as a father, would he have feared the loss of his son in a different way to my mother? It hurts that I will never know. I will never have my father tell me his fears, tell me that as a man it is okay to have fears. My father will never be the one to even teach me what it means to be a man. I'm having to figure that out on my own. If I have a son one day, I hope I'll be around to teach him all I learnt.
"You okay babe?" Roman asked coming back over to me now.
"What? Yeah," I replied coming back to reality. "Yeah, I'm okay."
"I'll give you boys a few minutes, but then I expect you both downstairs. Mum didn't spend ages trying to pick the best ice cream for dessert for none of it to be eaten," Roman's dad said jokingly before departing back downstairs.
The rest of the night went by a lot smoother. We followed Romeo downstairs after we collected ourselves a bit more in Roman's room. We all sat around the dining table with tubs of Ben and Jerry's as we conversed. Roman's father actually engaged in conversation with me where I was still asked a lot of questions but more casual ones like where I wanted to go to uni and what I planned to do in the future. I could tell both Romeo and Sofia were deliberately not asking about my family but I found myself actually wanting to talk about my parents so I told them small things about them like how I thought Romeo and my father would have gotten along.
Soon it came time for me to leave though.
"Uhh mum, you won't need the car tomorrow morning, will you?" Roman asked as we loaded the last of the plates into the dishwasher.
"No, feel free to use it." Sofia said.
"Cool thanks."
It was only when Roman brought me up to his room instead of to the car that I understood why he asked that.
"So, I was wondering if maybe I can stay round tonight? I know you didn't bring anything with you otherwise I would ask if you wanted to stay here," he said.
"You want to sleep round mine?"
"Yeah, if that's okay?"
Roman in my bed? Yeah, as if I would say no.
"Sure."
~~~~~~~~~
Hopefully you guys can see where Roman's dad is coming from :)