Archive of Our Own

Vatican City, 2009

Bellini made another tally on his scratch paper and felt his frustration mount at the sight of the eighteen other marks. Nineteen times. Nineteen times had Tedesco leaned in to whisper something to Adeyemi, the bright young thing from Nigeria that people were claiming was going to be the next Cyprian Michael Tansi.¹ Well, Bellini had read the man’s doctoral thesis and found it absolutely reprehensible and his interpretation of at least half a dozen different passages from Numbers to be severely lacking in both good sense and good taste. But that was just Bellini’s opinion. What did he know? He was only Chancellor of the Gregoriana while Adeyemi was spending half his time in Nigeria and half his time on the lecture circuit.

Maybe that was why Tedesco was leaning in for a twentieth time (twentieth!) to say something to Adeyemi. Tedesco had just finished his own book tour not three months prior. Bellini had bought his book, read it, reviewed it, and then promptly hid his copy in the back of his closet with Tedesco’s other two books and all the articles Tedesco had ever written. Bellini had left a copy of Tedesco’s first book on his shelves when he was still in Milan and Giulio had yet to stop needling him about it, even twenty years later. Now, he kept all of Tedesco’s work tucked away. Tedesco, of course, did the same, but given how his bookshelves were always overstuffed, no one would notice any of Bellini’s plain book covers were compared to Tedesco’s. 

“—with the next topic of discussion beginning at three o’clock sharp. Please ensure that you find your seats in time, my brothers.”

The bells tolled and Bellini was quick to leave the room, even though he had originally wanted to speak to the Dean, Martinez, about a possible joint authorship opportunity. He would have to find the old man later, right now, he needed a smoke, a good drink, or a good friend. All three would have been best but beggars couldn’t be choosers. As it was, Bellini felt the presence of Giulio at his side and was relieved to see that he was not wrong. His successor, and dear friend, was wearing an unhappy expression, which mystified Bellini. He had thought, all things considered, that the synod was going well. Goffredo’s inability to keep his mouth shut and focus on the topic at hand, aside. Just yesterday Thomas had given a rather excellent speech on how to increase education opportunities for disaffected youth in orphanages across central Africa. Of course, Aldo had helped Thomas make the slides for it, as Thomas was generally helpless with any sort of technology created after the turn of the 19th century, but he hadn’t seen the full presentation. But that was not the cause of Giulio’s ire. 

“Have you seen how much time Scozzazi has been allotted tomorrow?” he asked.

“No,” Bellini said, leaning in to light his cigarette off of Giulio’s. “I’m not attending tomorrow. I have a—”

“Almost two whole hours!” Giulio hissed. “Two hours of listening to that prick talk about the importance of aid work! Why are we listening to people who barely escaped the taxman’s noose? It’s a waste of our time and an insult to our intelligence!”

Bellini sighed. Scozzazi was a piece of work, that much was true. Bellini personally had no idea how the lucky bastard got away with half the things he did. But Bellini imagined that Giulio couldn’t care less about the prosecution’s shoddy case against Scozzazi and that the majority of his anger was aimed at the fact that Bellini would not be in attendance tomorrow. He tried to feel bad but any sort of sympathy dried up at the sight of Tedesco and Adeyemi leading a pack of their brothers-in-arms across the grounds to the cafeteria at the Casa Santa Marta. Bellini clenched his jaw and watched as Tedesco ignored him in favor of laughing along with whatever stupid fucking joke Adeyemi was telling him. Obnoxious bastard. Stupid fucking idiot. Arrogant—

“Ugh, don’t get me started on him,” Giulio said, having followed his gaze to the flock of demented sheep that Bellini was loath to call his brothers. “Did you see what Adeyemi was saying about integrating tribal customs with—”

“Are you having lunch here or in the city?” Bellini asked, cutting off whatever nonsense Giulio was about to say. He loved his friend but sometimes Giulio didn’t know when to shut his mouth before “accidentally” saying something offensive after “accidentally” forgetting the media training Bellini had forced him to sit through (twice!) before leaving Milan. “I was hoping to speak to Martinez before lunch but he seemed busy,” Bellini said, putting his cigarette butt back in the pack. He neglected to mention that he was also desperate for some fresh air after getting a front row seat to Tedesco and Adeyemi’s . . . bromance.

“Let’s go to the city. I’m glad you brought Martinez up.” Giulio linked his arm with Bellini and began to guide him to one of the gates out of the Vatican. “I heard the most delightful rumor about our dear Dean.”

Bellini had to fight the urge to let a grin split his face in two. “Oh? Myself as well. Shall we trade information?”

Hope, bright and eager, crossed Giulio’s face as he leaned in closer to whisper into Bellini’s ear something that Bellini already knew. But still, it was good to hear that someone else had heard the rumors that the Holy Father was slowly growing more and more ill. While the health of His Holiness, and all others who suffered pain and suffering, was something Bellini prayed for every night, there was no ignoring the small blossom of hope that had started to grow in his chest, every time he looked towards Martinez.

After the lunch break, when Cardinal Newby began the discussion on inter-faith dialogue, Bellini was ready. He had his arguments and his counter-arguments and his counter-counter-arguments prepared and, with Adeyemi and Tedesco separated, he would not be distracted. Bellini couldn’t help but wonder who was behind the seating arrangements as he found his seat in the front row, across the aisle from Tedesco—certainly not Thomas, who was assisting his old mentor. Usually Thomas did his best to keep Bellini and Tedesco as far away from each other as possible. 

Maybe Newby was underprepared and was just hoping that Bellini and Tedesco would run out the clock for him? 

Either way, Bellini purposefully busied himself as Tedesco walked in and took his seat. Next to him, Gambino leaned in to whisper to Tedesco and smirk at Bellini. He could imagine what Gambino was saying but Bellini didn’t care. Gambino was an idiot, only useful to crunch numbers for the Camerlengo and to run petty gossip-filled campaigns against whichever liberal-of-the-month he found himself in opposition to. Anything to distract from the skeletons in his own closet.

As he was straightening up his papers, Bellini noticed that someone had slipped a note underneath his placard. In familiar handwriting, Proverbs 25:21 was written. Bellini met Thomas’ eyes from across the room and winked at his old friend, unable to stop the corner of his mouth from ticking up into a smile as he saw the hangdog expression on Thomas’ face. A low chuckle stole his attention and, before he could stop himself, Bellini turned to see Tedesco staring at him, a cold sneer on his lips as he whispered to something Gambino said, never once looking away from Bellini.

It was only when the seat next to him was filled did Bellini relax. Martinez carried a notebook and folder, just like Bellini, but unlike Bellini he also had a slim puzzle book. Bellini couldn’t help the smile of incredulity that spread across his face when he met Martinez’s eye. Martinez pressed a single finger to his lips but leaned in to whisper, “Something has to keep me entertained as Newby stumbles along with his atrocious accent.”

“Which one?” Bellini asked, brow cocked. Martinez laughed and Bellini could help the victorious feeling that washed over him.

Tedesco would not make the next session easy—he never did, God bless him, God damn him—but at least Bellini had gotten some sense of victory in amusing Martinez. The Dean was notoriously difficult to make laugh, though he was quick to smile. When Bellini’s gaze drifted across the aisle, he was reminded of his earlier thought of Tedesco giving him a hard time as he noticed the cold look in the other man’s eyes. He lifted his chin, just a touch, unafraid of whatever nonsense Tedesco would spout.

Tedesco knew, as well as Bellini, that whatever Tedesco gave him, Bellini could return it tenfold.

“—what is the plan then?” Bellini asked, doing his best to don the robes of a bloodless academic, rather than his cardinal reds, as he leaned back in his chair. Tedesco hadn’t stood up yet; neither would Bellini. “Deny charity and aid to those who cannot recite the Our Father? Or will you settle for a Glory Be?”

There was, thankfully, a few chuckles from behind Bellini, but Bellini ignored them, too focused on Tedesco shaking his head. “I must admit, my brother cardinal, that your presupposition that the Muslims are unable to care for their own kind is disheartening. Or do you believe they hold so little care for the tenets of their own religious duties that they would refuse their kind care and zakat?” he asked, faux concern lacing his tone. 

Bellini gave him a bitter, reluctant half-smile, annoyed that Tedesco was equally as well-prepared as he was. Still: “And in the north, I have no doubt that they do. But what of central Africa? Southern Africa? Parts of the continent ravaged by war and human greed?” Bellini questioned. “When all communities, regardless of their faith, suffer, how can anyone turn their back on them? Would you turn your back to them, my brother, if they were to come knocking at your door?”

“Is it a question of turning our backs to all those who suffer? Or shielding our most vulnerable from additional suffering?” Tedesco asked. “Because how many of the faithful in, say, Nigeria—” Bellini could not restrain himself from glancing at Adeyemi for just a moment. “—have suffered as a result of Islamist extremism? Just this summer, a new extremist Muslim group, this Boko Haram, has killed over one thousand people in Nigeria in mere days. While I weep for their deaths and pray for their souls, is it wrong to say that it is the result of a religion that begs for vi—” Tedesco cut himself off, intentionally. Bellini could feel his blood begin to boil. After letting his words, spoken and unspoken alike, linger in the hall, Tedesco continued. “This is not a question of refusing to allocate aid and resources to those who need it but rather a question of why certain people need it and why others do not.” Tedesco’s words, predictably, set off a round of murmurs, both in agreement and disagreement. 

After all, it didn’t take an idiot to figure out who Tedesco imagined to be in those particular in-groups and out-groups. 

Bellini couldn’t help his own derisive scoff from slipping free. Very quietly, he heard a noise of disapproval from Martinez next to him but he paid no mind to it. “I share in your grief for the deaths of innocent people from acts of cruel violence,” Bellini said, his voice cold despite his best efforts against it. Everyone knew that Tedesco’s words, and his sorrow, were bullshit. “Esepically given that those who died in Bauchi, Maiduguri, Potiskum, and Wudil were more likely than not Muslim themselves. And yet, instead of attempting to help them, to bridge the gap between our two communities, here y- we sit, questioning as to whether it would be a fair distribution of our resources.” Looking past Tedesco now, he stood to address the room at large. “That being said, Nigeria is not the only country on the continent with a variety of different faiths in its borders. How can we to tell the faithful in those countries that they should ‘do unto others what they would have done unto themselves’ and in the next breath beseech them to ignore the nonbeliever, the stranger, the alien, the Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free people.² Where is the mutual love in that, my brothers?”³

The flurry of responses, mostly good and only some bad, was enough for Newby to take control of the situation. When Bellini sat back down, he noticed that Martinez had written a room number on his papers, and a time. He acknowledged it with a nod of his head and spared a moment for how late the meeting would run. After all, his spat with Tedesco aside, they still had plans for the evening. 

But as Bellini hurried out of the Vatican, he cursed that his work bag was full of books, papers, and notebook, slowing him down. How could it have become so annoyingly bulky when Bellini was supposed to be overseeing some new technology integration program at the Gregorian?

But as long as Bellini was struggling with the bag and trying to race home before it was too late, it allowed him to not obsess over the dressing down that Martinez and Thomas gave him, that unlikely duo. Thomas was disappointed because Bellini hadn’t even tried to restrain himself from going after Tedesco any chance he could; Martinez was annoyed because, somewhere around the third hour mark, Bellini had nearly lost all ground he had gotten over the traditionalists and conservatives by almost mentioning female ordination. Even Giulio, unused to being in a room with the more academically inclined liberals like Martinez, Löwenstein, Vandroogenbroek, or Yi, had taken the chance to scold him for mentioning such topics, and so publicly! Bellini had accepted the dressing-down with as much grace as he was able to before leaving, even as his pride stung with knowledge that he had very nearly humiliated himself beyond redemption before his peers. 

Perhaps, Aldo thought to himself as he arrived at his apartment building, and the figure surrounded by smoke and shadows came into view, he should thank Goffredo and how his mouth dropped open in a rare visible act of shock that signaled to Bellini he needed to shut his mouth right away as Tedesco sensed he was about to the utter the words “female” and “ordination” in the same sentence. 

Then again, when Goffredo did not jump to open the door for Aldo, content to finish the cigarette he was smoking as the brown bag of foodstuffs rested at his feet. Besides some leafy greens and a few cans, given the shape of the bag, Aldo didn’t know what was in there. And, given that Goffredo was content to continue smoking rather than greet him, Aldo would obviously have to wait to find out. But even as the seconds dragged on, one last insult became clear.

Goffredo was ignoring him.

Ignoring him! 

That fucking—

Aldo ignored Goffredo in return and went to open the door himself. He didn’t look back to see if Goffredo was slowed by the groceries he carried. Instead, Aldo lugged his bag up the steps and into his apartment. Goffredo trailed behind him, unusually silent. Normally, the other man would have already started talking. Talking about the trains, about his family, about the menu for the night, about anything and everything. Normally, Aldo liked to hear Goffredo’s endless stream of consciousness but tonight Aldo was unable to forget that, for most of the day, Goffredo’s chattiness was directed at Adeyemi. Perhaps Goffredo had only come to Aldo’s apartment because he had told Adeyemi everything and now wanted to repeat himself to Aldo.  

But then why was Goffredo quiet?

As Aldo was busy sorting through the last three days of junk mail, looking for a letter from his cousins that was meant to arrive with information about their holiday plans, Goffredo had moved to the kitchen without a word to Aldo. Goffredo was familiar with Aldo’s kitchen and hardly needed any help to find pots, pans, and dishes, but usually he would have already starting insisting that Aldo rearrange something in his kitchen—the order of his cutlery, the arrangement of his spice rack, the mugs hanging above the sink—in order to make it easier to cook in. But even as Aldo pretended to examine the supermarket ad for almost five minutes, Goffredo said nothing to him. The other man just continued to cook and prepare their dinner for the night.

Humiliated and angry, Aldo went to his room to unpack his bag and shower. As he stared at himself in the mirror, steam fading in and out around the edges of it, he wondered, not for the first time, why he was even . . . entangled with Goffredo. But a loud clatter and curse snapped him out of his head and sent Aldo racing down the hall to the kitchen. 

A pot lid was on the floor, still steaming. A pair of tongs were sticking out of said pot, which was one of his larger ones. Goffredo had his hand under some running water and was glaring a hole in said appendage. 

Ignoring the lid and the fact that he was only in his underwear, Aldo turned off the stove and gently took Goffredo’s hand for himself, noting the angry red mark by his knuckles. “What happened?” he asked.

Goffredo hadn’t looked at him yet, too busy still glaring at himself before spitting out, “Brushed it aside the side.”

“Why are you even using a pot of that size?” Aldo asked. When Goffredo said nothing in return, Aldo sighed. It seemed Goffredo’s insistence on being silent would not be going anywhere.  “It looks like it’ll be fine.”

“I know it will be,” Goffredo snapped, pulling his hand away. He put it under the water and opened one of Aldo’s drawers with his uninjured hand, looking around for an extra dishcloth.

Aldo looked at him, incredulous. “Are you serious?”

“What?”

“What is your problem, Goffredo?” he asked, well aware that he was jumping the gun and likely just making more of a problem for himself than if he had just kept his mouth shut until Goffredo was (hopefully) placated with dinner and wine. “I’m just trying to help you. There’s no need to be so stubborn, even if it is just over some stupid little burn.”

“I didn’t ask for your help,” Goffredo said. “Go back and weep in the shower, Bellini, or whatever it was that you were doing.”

Aldo laughed in Goffredo’s face, knowing full well how much Goffredo hated it when someone did that to him. And, judging by the furious blush on Goffredo’s face, he was hating it very much at that moment. “You must be out of your fuckin’ mind, talkin’ to me like that, in my own home,” he said. “Get your shit together, Tedesco, or get the fuck out.”

“Oh, the truth comes out,” Goffredo crowed and Aldo could do nothing but stare at him, certain that his confusion was written clearly across his face. “What? Do you think I didn’t hear about you and Sabbadin going for lunch? Was he meant to come over—”

“What?”

“—tonight? How late am I permitted to stay? When will your replacement arrive? Or perhaps it is Tomma—”

“Hold- Are you jealous?”

Aldo was surprised at how quickly his frustration, all the anger and annoyance that had been built up during the day, disappeared. Even his, to call a spade a spade, his hurt at Goffredo’s dismissal of assistance just moments ago, disappeared as well. Instead, those feelings were being replaced with amusement, and incredulity. Because surely Goffredo was not getting mad at Aldo for a myriad of alleged slights when Goffredo had done the same thing to Aldo all day! Never mind the fact that they both knew Thomas was stuck helping out Newby until he went back to England and that Newby was more than pleased to use Thomas as an interpreter until he left.

Marveling at the idea of Goffredo being jealous that someone like Giulio or Thomas would steal Aldo’s attention away from Goffredo, Aldo saw Goffredo’s jawline turn white as the other man grit his teeth together.

Blinking, Aldo realized that his surprised utterance was not, in fact, a question, but rather a statement, a correct reading of the situation. 

Goffredo was jealous.

It was clear to both Aldo and Goffredo that Aldo’s assessment of the situation was correct. Instantly, Goffredo attempted to rectify the situation by, immediately, opening his mouth to try and outrun the truth of the matter. “Jealous?” he echoed. “Ha! What are you talking about? For me to be jealous would mean that I actually give—” Goffredo cut himself off and Aldo narrowed his eyes, madly curious to know where he intended to end that sentence. But the other man moved on from it. “You were the one ignoring me all day,” he snapped, trying to switch the conversation around on Aldo. Unfortunately for Goffredo, Aldo would not get tripped up so easily. “Why wouldn’t you decide to ignore our evening plans as well?”

As usual, a thrum of pleasure hummed through Aldo’s body when Goffredo used the possessive pronoun. It almost made him forget the slights of the day. But not quite.

“First of all,” Aldo said, crowding Goffredo against the sink, boxing him in with an arm on both sides of him, “you were ignoring me first.”

“No, I wasn’t!” Goffredo denied, hurrying to contradict Aldo, as always.

“Don’t interrupt me and, yes, you were,” Aldo said, bringing a hand up to gently cradle Goffredo’s cheek in his palm and place a silencing thumb over his lips. “All morning, you and Adeyemi were whispering back and forth, like middle school miscreants. Then you took lunch with him. And, of course, you repeated that behavior with Gambino right in front of me for the rest of the day. Just because I wasn’t playing the same game with Giulio or Martinez or even Thomas doesn’t mean that I was ignoring you, Goffredo.”

Aldo could feel Goffredo’s jaw clenching and unclenching beneath his hand but, thankfully, he stayed silent. The troubled, frustrated look in his eyes did not disappear, however, even as he slowly began to relax. Then: “You started ignoring me last week when you chose to sit next to Martinez instead of with Tommaso and me.” After a beat, Goffredo repeated, pouting, “You ignored me first.”

Aldo’s brow furrowed as he thought back to the meal in question, the meal in which Martinez had insisted Bellini sit with him and a few of the older cardinals, including Rodríguez, the twice-previous Secretary of State who, though he left his position after the conclave back in ‘05. Rodríguez was, according to his own words, too old and tired to travel around but not too old or tired to meddle around. Martinez had gently been urging Bellini to leave the Gregorian and embrace the pastoral life again; Rodríguez was in agreement with Martinez, though he was urging patience. Bellini was not an idiot, he could read between lines and, terrible though it was, he could not help the excitement he felt at the idea of having two high-ranking, and influential, cardinals in his corner. Had he even noticed that Tedesco and Thomas had an empty seat at their table? He had noticed that Thomas was sitting with Tedesco, yes, but not much beyond that.

“I’m sorry,” Aldo apologized easily. He always found it easier to just apologize to Goffredo for the little things. His bo—entanglement was prone to turning molehills into mountains; if Aldo pushed back every time it happened, well, they probably never would have shared that last bottle of wine between them at a conference back in ‘02, would they have? “I didn’t notice the seat and, honestly, it didn’t occur to me that you had saved a spot for me. I’m sorry, Goffredo.”

The tension continued to leak out of Goffredo’s body and the hard look in his eyes was slowly replaced with something kinder. “I was trying to steam the spinach for you,” he said, jerking his chin in the direction of the stove. “That’s why I burned my hand. The pot is too deep to reach the colander without assistance.”

Aldo smiled at him. He had introduced the concept of steaming vegetables as opposed to boiling them and Goffredo was, slowly, coming around to it, though he rarely steamed them himself. For Goffredo to steam some spinach for him, Aldo couldn’t help his smile. “You can just use a saucepan. The water doesn’t drip onto the stove top,” he said.

“But the lid doesn’t cover it completely,” Goffredo disagreed.

“So it takes a few extra minutes,” Aldo said, shrugging.

Goffredo rolled his eyes. “It’s not about the time, Aldo,” he said, “it’s about making sure it cooks evenly. This is how you get food poisoning.”

Aldo laughed and let his hand fall down to rest on Goffredo’s waist. “But if I get food poisoning, then I get to make you my famous Bellini family soup. So maybe you should hope that I get sick, hmm?”

“You’re no fun when you’re sick, Aldino.”

“Oh? You think I’m fun, Goffredo?” Aldo asked. He couldn’t step any closer to Goffredo if he wanted to (and he did want to), but he could press his bare torso against Goffredo instead. Goffredo’s eyes dipped down and Aldo watched them trace the lines of his body before Goffredo snapped out of it and looked at him again. 

After a beat, he cleared his throat and shrugged, playing at nonchalance despite the blush on his cheeks. “On occasion,” he said.

“Oh? And is tonight one of those occasions?” Aldo asked, noting with glee how Goffredo’s eyes darkened at the sound of Aldo’s voice, low and rich with promise. 

That was all the invitation that Goffredo needed, apparently, because the other man surged up and kissed him, his uninjured hand reaching up to cradle the back of Aldo’s bald head. Aldo welcomed the kiss instantly, opening his mouth while the hand on Goffredo’s waist slipped beneath his shirt, desperate to touch him. Goffredo’s other hand, cold and wet from the water, made its way to Aldo’s chest and Aldo huffed a laugh into Goffredo’s mouth as he tweaked Aldo’s nipple. When Goffredo exerted gentle pressure on his pec, Aldo leaned away and was pleased to see Goffredo’s flush had continued down his neck and under his shirt.

“Sit with me tomorrow," Goffredo ordered.

“I’m not attending tomorrow. But the day after I will,” Aldo promised.

Goffredo frowned, his lips pulling down into a pretty pout, and Aldo couldn’t help but kiss it away. “C’mon,” he said, “let’s get this cleaned up first.”

“And second?”

“Oh, I think you can imagine.”