palermo （day one）

The first time I almost tell Theo I love them in Palermo, we're at Mercato di Ballarò.

"Quanto," they say, enunciating. "Not quando, that's when. Quanto is how much."

"Quanto," I repeat.

Theo nods. "That's the only word you need."

"Quanto?" we ask the leathery old woman grilling stigghiola under a thick cloud of smoke, and she sells us skewers of lamb guts for two euros. Quanto to panelle (crispy chickpea fritters) and quanto to pani ca' meusa (lamb spleen sandwiches). On and on through the noisy, endless street market, to rickety carts and steaming gingham-covered vats, between pungent bins of fresh-caught fish and produce stands so overfull that artichoke leaves cascade to the ground. We taste everything we can. Somewhere ahead, Pinocchio bobs above the crowd like our merry little North Star.

"I feel so much pressure to pick the best arancini," I say, eyeing yet another cart selling them. "It's like, we only get one chance to have our first arancini in Sicily."

"I think all fried rice balls are precious gifts from God," Theo says. "Ooh, but those are really big, holy shit— Ciao! Quanto?"

Once, when we first moved in together, I accidentally killed my thyme plant. I'd carefully caramelized onions and figs and made pate feuilletée from scratch for this one perfect galette, and when I went to snip some sprigs for the finishing touch, I knocked the plant out of the window. While I was mourning my exploded thyme on the sidewalk, Theo was substituting a spoonful of Aleppo pepper flakes in total disregard of my vision. It was improvised on instinct, and it was better.

I love ingredients because they have memories. Stories, histories, personalities. A peach has a memory of every finger that's touched it. A vanilla bean cures for months. Sometimes when I take a first bite, I try to name every individual ingredient, to find the gardener who pruned the tree that yielded the olives for the oil coating this specific pan in this specific kitchen watched over by one specific cook, who came to work thinking of his mother's skillet back home.

Theo cares about all of this, but they're an instincts-first eater. They understand ingredients like old friends who don't need anything when they come over. They know when to apply their knowledge and remind me when to think less and simply open my mouth. They question me, surprise me, challenge me. Taste is what I do; Theo makes me better at it.

Theo buys an arancini the size of a grapefruit and splits it down the middle, gasping as it reveals a center of spiced yellow rice and dark ragù. When it hits their tongue, they close their eyes and wiggle their shoulders with pleasure.

I almost say it then. It's so clear in my mind. I'm in love with you.

The man dunking whole octopuses into a huge vat of boiling water bellows at the top of his voice, "Polpo, polpo!" And the moment passes.

The second time, it almost slips out on a laugh.

We're on the stairs of Teatro Massimo, the opera house near the city center, digesting between market crawls. Theo counts the steps, finds a spot, then lays their long body down.

"What are you doing?"

"The Godfather Part III," they say, as if this should be obvious. They speak up into the sky, their head nearly resting on the stone. "This is where Mary dies at the end."

"How could I forget." I climb up and gaze down at them. Their sunglasses have slid onto their forehead, and their freckles are on glorious display. "You know, I didn't think Sofia Coppola was that bad."

"That's because you have a soft heart and you liked The Virgin Suicides."

I offer them my hand, and they give me that familiar look, eyes narrowed, mouth taut at the corners like, If I say one word I'll kill us both laughing. That look made our homeroom teachers stop assigning seats in alphabetical order to keep us separated.

They take my hand and, instead of letting me pull them up, they pull me down beside them.

Sometimes, when people first meet me now, they think I'm a serious person. They see an art degree drinking espresso in a Parisian kitchen and imagine some Nietzsche-reading gourmand. They don't know how loud my laugh can be, or how shamelessly I'll commit to a bit, or the dirty jokes Theo and I taught ourselves in Elvish to use at the Renaissance festival when we were thirteen. It's a shame, because I like that about myself. My favorite parts of me are the ones that Theo brings out, the ones that grew to match theirs.

It almost comes out as we're laughing together on the steps. The stones reflect the sun like we reflect each other, and I think, I love you.

Theo says, "Is that guy choking on a sausage?"

I say, "What?"

There is, it turns out, a tourist on the sidewalk choking on a hunk of street meat. We sit up as Blond Calum leaps into action, deploying an expert Heimlich maneuver to completion. The gathered crowd cheers, and the tourist gives Calum a grateful hug. He's a hero. It's no longer our moment; it's Calum's.

"Damn," Theo says, as Calum is enveloped by six arms—Dakota's, Montana's, Ginger's. "He's definitely getting laid tonight."

The third time, the words stick in my molars like candied orange peel.

Secreted away in the monastery behind the Chiesa di Santa Caterina is a tiny dolcería selling sweets made from the nuns' recipes. I learned in Venice that most of Italy's famous sweets originated in monastery kitchens, crafted by monks and nuns with no indulgences but sugar and flour. These nuns make Fabrizio's favorite cannoli in Palermo.

In the piazza between the church and the monastero everyone still buzzes with Blond Calum's heroism. Theo's helping Montana fix a broken dress strap with safety pins and keeps glancing from Montana to the Calums to Dakota and back, observing everything.

Our eyes meet.

I'm gathering valuable intel, go get cannoli and I'll tell you what I find.

Inside the dolcería, every confection suggests the simplicity of a kitchen with only a handful of ingredients and the obsession of a thoroughly cloistered nun. Almond paste molded into clamshells and stuffed with cream and apricot jam, or sculpted and painted to make glossy, lifelike figs and pears and peaches. A few extravagant cakes are topped with piped curls of white icing and piles of sugared fruit—a sign declares these TRIONFO DI GOLA—TRIUMPH OF GLUTTONY. God, if I could title my memoir.

I order cannoli for two, Theo's with extra pistachio bits and candied orange. Outside, under the fountain of San Domenico, Theo can't believe the size of them.

"Jesus, it's like a burrito." They take their cannolo without having to ask which one is theirs, then notice the plate in my other hand. "What's that?"

"I got you something else," I say, showing them a small, domed cake coated in white icing and topped with a candied cherry.

Theo tilts their head. "Is it supposed to look like—" They glance up at the saint in the fountain, then whisper, "—a titty?"

"Yes, they're called St. Agatha's Breasts," I say. "I saw them and knew you had to see it too."

"I extremely do," Theo says, taking it from me happily. "Oh, that reminds me . . ."

They report the status of the Calums-Dakota-Montana sex polygon, which is that every side has now been consummated except for Calum-on-Calum, but the sudden exhibition of Blond's livesaving skills may be reigniting a nostalgic flame in Ginger. Montana and Dakota are doing their best to encourage this, because Montana is a completist. I listen with my mouth full of thick, sugary mascarpone and find myself rooting harder than ever for the Calums. Seems like a waste to never have sex with the person who pulled you from the mouth of a shark.

Over Theo's shoulder, Ginger Calum swipes a bit of mascarpone from Blond's chin with his thumb. I wonder if he's spent his life the same way I have, finding small ways to look after the person who saved us when we were young. I hope he gets as much joy from it as I do.

"Incredible cannoli, by the way," Theo says, chewing a bit of orange. "You're so good at ordering for me."

My eyes meet Theo's. They must see the softness on my face, how sweet it tastes to be told I've taken good care of them. Pink blooms on their cheeks. This has always been the part they've been least willing to see, how caring for them is something I want to do and something they can allow themself to have.

They don't turn away now. They lift their chin and hold my gaze. The moment falls over us like a net in the sea.

I'm going to say it as soon as I find the right words. I'm in love with you. I love every part of loving you, even the parts you don't think you deserve. You are the love of my life.

I begin to say, "I—"

Theo's phone rings. It's Sloane, and they've just started speaking to each other again, so Theo needs to take it.

"Of course," I say. "Of course."

The fourth time I almost tell Theo I love them, we're under a vault of stars.

The Martorana is nearly a thousand years old, and it looks like a place out of time. It's a physical record of the island's history, with its Spanish Baroque facade and Romanesque bell tower grafted over the original Byzantine dome and radiating Islamic niches. Inside the basilica, golden Greek mosaics glitter from the floor to the vaulted ceilings.

I remember the night Theo drove us out into the desert and held me under the blackberry swirl of the Milky Way. They kissed me as deep as the sky, every point of skin contact as sharp and hot as a star. They showed me the galaxy, then made me feel it. That's one of Theo's natural gifts, the way beauty moves through them like stained glass. It illuminates them, and they transform it in kind.

They stand in this luminous church and look at the ceiling of the nave, which arcs upward into a heaven of deep blue tiles and blazing gold stars. Another galaxy for Theo.

What I want to say is, Do you know that you refract light? But I love you could be close if I said it right, hushed in reverence beneath a mosaic sky.

I step toward them.

A bell rings; the church is closing for the day.

The fifth time, we've just eaten one of the most interesting meals of our lives.

The first restaurant in Palermo with a Michelin star sits within the stone archways of what was once Antonello Gagini's Renaissance sculpting studio. In a way, it's still an artist's workshop. Blood orange–glazed veal sweetbread with fennel confit, sea anemone with salted ricotta and sauce Choron—what was all that, if not art?

Throughout dinner, Theo made quick-and-dirty use of the wine list to win over the sommelier, jotting down notes and ideas on a napkin while carrying on conversation with the Swedes. They were in peak form, all chaos and intent, a rough touch and a smooth result. It reminded me that Timo hadn't yet had their Michelin star when I left California. Theo helped them get it.

I remember what they said in Rome, how they still dream of Fairflower. I may not believe in it for me, but . . . for us? Some sweet future where Theo does their best things and I do mine, and we discover that in our years apart, we learned what we needed to actually do it?

Maybe it couldn't have worked then, but maybe it could work now. I don't know where, or when. But maybe when Theo believes in one thing and throws their whole weight behind it, anything can happen.

We're in an alley beside the restaurant, and Theo is chatting easily with the bartender on his smoke break, and I'm looking on from down the sidewalk. Theo is just—Theo is cool. I'm so proud to know them, to have the privilege of being important to a person like them. I want to be by their side forever. I want to build something with them. Something new, something we could only make now. I want to invent it with them and trust them with it.

They return with a paper bag, which they offer to me.

"Seemed like this one was your favorite."

Inside is a tiny to-go portion of the saffron panna cotta we had for dolci. I know what it meant when I did this for Theo in Paris, hoping to show them I was sorry for ever hurting them, that I still cared and wanted to make things right.

I look up to find handsome, enduring Theo thumbing the same knuckles they bruised for me when we were children. I know them. I know this person better than I know anything, better than Bernini or Middle-earth or the importance of good butter. And they know me, and they're still looking.

This must be the moment at last. Here in long-awaited Palermo, at the end of the day, our stomachs full. This is where it's all led.

I take their hand, gently lace my fingers through theirs.

"Theo."

They can't hear it. Someone else yells their name at the same time, twice as loud, beckoning us out for drinks. Theo gives me a look, and I know they want to go. They're too curious about what might happen, too afraid to miss it.

I untwine our hands.

"Let's go."

We move through bar after bar, terrazzo after sticky bar top after dance floor, through the thick fog of Sicilian night. We take shots of bitter amaro and order Negronis with prosecco. I keep waiting for another opening, for a quiet moment with Theo, but there's so much happening. Everything keeps exploding around us, spilled drinks and stolen kisses and cherries flaring at the ends of cigarettes.

We lose our friends in a dark, cramped bar with live music, a woman playing an upright bass and a man on the saxophone, the crowd thick and surging and full of smells. Theo is holding a drink with fish bones in it, complaining that my alcohol tolerance doesn't make any sense, that I should be drunker. We can barely hear each other, so we bob wordlessly, eddied by the bodies around us, floating on an incandescent tide.

The band starts up a new song, and I recognize the first chords. Even with the words in Italian, I'd know it anywhere.

"Is that—" Theo shouts. "Are they actually playing—"

"‘Can't Stop Loving You,'" I confirm.

Phil Collins, in a dive bar in Palermo. We're alone in the crowd, staring wide-eyed at each other, swaying impossibly to a song we've sung together a hundred times, never knowing it would be the story of our lives. Nothing could convince me that isn't some kind of sign.

Theo leans into my ear and says, "Will you—?"

I can't make out the end of their sentence.

"What?"

They try again. "Will you please—?"

"I can't hear you!"

The music shifts, dipping into the end of the first verse, quieter now, I could say that's the way it goes, and I could pretend and you won't know—

This time, I hear Theo when they look into my eyes and say, "Kiss me."

They look like their heart might break, as if they're begging mercy for a lost cause when they reach out to cup my face.

"One kiss, and I'll never ask you again," they say. "I'll get over it one day, I swear, and we can be friends, but I—I just need a better kiss to remember it by."

The crowd pushes us together, and I feel like I'm somewhere else, like I'm everywhere, like every heart in the room must be synced to the hammer of mine.

"Remember what, Theo?"

And they answer, "How it feels to be in love with you."

The band kicks off the chorus. Theo's drink hits the floor as I pull them to me.

"I can't believe you got to say it first," I say over the music.

Their lips part. "You're—you—?"

"I never stopped," I tell them, finally. "Theo, I never stopped."

When they smile, it's gold in the sky, unfolding green hills, a country of endless possibilities, the relief of the last turn before home. I take them by the waist and kiss them with everything in me, everything we made of each other, my mouth to their mouth like we sculpted them with our own hands for this, and Theo holds my face between their palms and kisses me back, deep and sure.

I understand, finally, in the heat of their mouth. They love me. I love them. It was always as simple as that.

We had two rules left. No kissing, no penetration.

We start with kissing.

We kiss on the crowded street outside the bar, one of dozens of couples pushing each other against rough stone walls under strings of hot lights, Theo's tongue in my mouth and my hands in their hair. We kiss on our way back to the hostel, my lip caught between Theo's teeth. We kiss on the stairs up to our rooms and again in the tight, humid hallway, gasping with slack mouths, hands everywhere. We kiss as if we're inventing it, as if everything else we've done together since we got to Italy was chaste and this is sex.

I back Theo into the door of my room and lick into their mouth, swallowing their moan like vin santo, heavy and sweet and lingering.

"Since we're being honest," I say, out of breath, wrenching myself away long enough to get out the room key, "I want you to fuck me."

"I was about to say the same to you," Theo pants.

Then we're crashing inside, grappling across the wall, tearing at each other's clothes. I spare half a breath to thank Italy for inspiring us to button our shirts less, because those are gone in seconds, whipped over our heads so we can press chest to chest, skin to skin, lips sliding wet and raw into another fit of furious kissing. By some miracle I manage to undo Theo's shorts without looking, and Theo tugs my drawstrings loose, and then we're nearly naked.

For a moment our eyes lock, and we stand motionless in the amber nighttime glow of Palermo through the window, arrested under the intensity of each other's attention.

And then Theo smiles, and it's the most beautiful thing I've seen on the entire tour.

"It's so weird when your face gets that serious," they say.

"Yours too."

"Like, who are we?"

I laugh, and I say, because I can, "I love you."

"I love you," Theo says. They love me.

They reach for their shorts on the floor and dig something shiny and gold from the pocket—I think it's one of those fucking Jeans condoms from last night, but instead, they hand me a single euro.

"Flip for it?"

When we were together, this was how we decided who would be fucking whom when we both wanted the same thing. Heads for Theo, tails for me.

I toss the coin across the room.

"I want everything."

Theo's eyes darken.

"Everything?"

"Everything."

They pull me close by the hinge of my jaw and brand my mouth with a kiss, and then they shove me onto the bed.

I can see their mind working behind dilated pupils, strategizing, making plans for me. I was already hard, but being looked at like that by them makes me ache.

"Hands and knees."

A warm shiver courses through me, and I do as I'm told. Theo climbs onto the bed behind me, strips me bare, and sets directly to work with their mouth.

I have long believed that being eaten out by Theo Flowerday is enough to make a person understand why erotic writers of history called an orgasm a crisis. The dedication, the skill, the endurance, the total uninhibited enthusiasm, the swimmer's breath control—they lavish me with it, rim and tease and press with their tongue until I'm whimpering and sinking down onto my elbows, widening my legs and rolling my hips.

"That's good," they say, breath shockingly cool on wet skin. Another whimper slips out. "You're being so good. You want more?"

"Please," I say, voice already wrecked. We've barely even started.

I direct Theo to the lube in my bag and watch over my shoulder as they slick up their fingers with the swift confidence of an expert. It occurs to me distantly that Theo has done a lot of fucking since the last time they fucked me, and knowing them, they'll have picked up a million new ways to be good at it. They were already the best fuck I ever had, and now they may be even better.

I may go out like Raphael tonight in this hostel bed. Theo may actually kill me.

They ease me open with smooth, deliberate purpose. I haven't let anyone inside me like this since I left home, but Theo is patient, as promised. They kiss the small of my back and work their way inside until the stretch becomes more pleasure than pain, and then something past pleasure, a breathtaking fullness, as if some missing piece of me has been returned at last. And then their fingertips graze that bundle of nerves inside of me.

"Fuck," I gasp, my back arching at the shock of sensation. Theo smiles against my skin.

"Right where I left it."

"More. Please."

They push in again, brushing the same spot, and a broken sound wrenches out of me. My shoulders finally give. I scramble to pull a pillow under me, tucking my chin into my shoulder, desperate to watch as Theo balances on their knees and lines their hips up behind me. Their fingers are buried so deep that their palm presses against my ass, and when our eyes lock, they reach around with their slicked left hand and—Jesus, fuck—wrap their fist around me.

"I'm gonna fuck you like this," Theo tells me, voice rough but determined, "and just when you're about to come, I want you to tell me. Then we switch, and you fuck me until we both finish. Okay?"

"Yes," I manage to say. "Fuck, yes, that sounds perfect. I want that."

"Until then," Theo says, "I want you to be a good boy and take it."

"Yes," I say, more aroused than I've possibly ever been in my life. "Yes."

They brace their pelvis against the back of their own hand and fuck me like they said they would, using the steady, relentless roll of their hips to guide their fingers in and out, fingertips skating over that sensitive spot inside me. Their other hand matches the rhythm, so that every time they push inside, their hips push me into the tight circle of their fist. I was right—they've never fucked me like this, never pinned me between two points of pleasure and held me there with their full strength. They're stronger, surer, and I feel so fucking good beneath them.

"God," Theo groans. "You're such a little slut sometimes."

My heart clenches, a weak, grateful sound breaking loose.

"You like that?" they ask. "You like when I call you that?"

"Yeah, yes, fucking—love it. Feels good. Feels like—praise."

"It is," they say in the lowest, gentlest part of their voice. "You're so good. So sweet. Such a perfect slut for me."

I let my mouth hang open so they can fuck all the sounds they want from me, one of my hands braced against the headboard to take it better. It's so good like this, so good when it's Theo, so good to be home in capable hands. Complex thought evaporates into sparkling firmament overhead, and far below, I bite the pillow and want only very simple things, to be held and fucked and told I'm pretty, to be good for the person I love.

"Theo," I stammer, barely holding myself together. "Theo, I'm—I'm close."

"Yeah?"

The last thing my body wants is for Theo to stop stroking me, but I find the fortitude to reach between my legs and guide their hand away, down the wetness I've been steadily leaking onto the sheets.

"Yeah."

All at once, Theo's hands and body leave me.

The parts of me that had gone pliant and molten instantly cool like volcanic rock. Hard with need, with intent, with a consuming desire to release everything that's been locked inside me for so much longer than we've been in this bed. I gather myself, wanting to use my strength. I want to be the one giving. I want to hear Theo beg for me the way I did for them, to—

Something light smacks into the side of my face.

I blink down at the bed. It's a condom. The foil wrapper says, JEANS.

"I—I thought we didn't save any of those."

I turn to see Theo naked atop the sheets, propped up on their elbows with one knee bent, freckled cheeks red with exertion and a halo of sweat on their brow. They're smirking, pleased with their performance and now their comedic timing.

"Fabrizio slipped me one before we left," they say. "Come on, I wanna see you."

In a second my feet are planted on the floor and I'm dragging them to the foot of the bed by their ankles as they laugh out a yelp of surprise.

"Is this the manhandling you were talking about?"

"Yes," I say, standing between their legs, tugging them closer so their hips are nearly at the edge. "Come here."

"Zut alors, I feel like a sack of flour— Oh fuck."

I cut them off with a touch, the flat of my thumb drawing a blunt, smearing circle just the way they like, the way I did to that peach in Monaco. I bite back a swear when I feel how astonishingly wet they are, even though it's the first they've been touched tonight. All this melting softness, all because of how much they enjoyed fucking me. I'm kneeling before I know it, half hunger, half supplication.

"What are you doing?" they demand, watching me on their elbows. "You're supposed to fuck me."

"Let me taste," I say. "Please." And God knows Theo will never deny me a meal.

I fill my mouth with that innate, vital bittersweetness of them, pull them between my lips and savor. My tongue dips briefly, indulgently—Theo moans—and I decide that's enough to satisfy the craving.

"Thank you," I say, adoring the crease of annoyance between their brows as I stand. I grip their hips, not quite pressing where they want me. "Did you want me to keep going?"

"Fucking cocktease," they whine. My heart sings. "Do something, please."

"I will, if you can be a good—" I pause. "What should I call you?"

Theo blinks, like I've asked them to solve my riddles three in the middle of sex.

"Uh—definitely not girl."

"No, obviously. Boy?"

"Sometimes," Theo says. They lower their gaze to the point where our bodies nearly meet, biting their lip at the sight of us. In a quiet, raw voice, they say, "I could be your bottom, if you want."

My body answers for me, visibly twitching.

"Yeah?" I breathe out. "You want me to top you?"

Theo looks up with wide eyes, something wild and new in them. They nod fast and hard.

I press the condom packet to their lower lip.

"Then be a good bottom for me."

With no further instruction, they rip the packet open with their teeth.

When I'm ready, I guide their hands to the backs of their own thighs, pushing their knees up toward their chest, and they catch on quickly to this too. A vulnerable blush spills like wine down their throat, but they don't look away. They hold my gaze and open themself to me.

"That's perfect," I say, taking them by the waist, voice shaking. "God, I fucking adore you."

The ease of the first push shocks a gasp from us both, as if their body has kept a place for me. One roll of my hips and I sink to the hilt, and we're there together, fluid and engulfing and known.

"Fuck me," Theo begs. So I do.

It's furious and desperate and deep, the sounds of our bodies filling our little half-dark room. Theo takes it beautifully. They hold their head up to watch as long as they can, stomach muscles shaking with the effort, lip bitten between their teeth, hair bouncing across their brow. When they collapse onto the bed, they fall back in glorious surrender. I'm barely in control of my body, but I'm so absolutely inside of it, aware of every nerve, every rippling touch, the most of everything.

I always loved how similar our bodies were, that we were almost the exact same height and size, as if we were so entwined that we grew to mirror each other. I loved how easy it was to touch myself and pretend I was touching them, how we had the same insatiable appetites. And in this bed, in our bodies, I'm overwhelmed with the understanding that we never stopped reflecting each other. We've become a perfect match, two lovers with equal capacity and equal desire to fuck and be fucked.

I surge onto the bed, catching one of Theo's legs to hold them open as I crush our mouths together.

"I love you," I say, trembling all over, our faces close enough to share breath.

They wrap their arms around my neck and press their forehead to mine.

"I love you," they answer. "I love you so fucking much."

That's all it takes to send me over. I hold back just long enough to watch their mouth drop open at the first crest, and then I'm swept out to sea with them, plunged deep and locked in Theo's embrace, hot tears in my eyes. I've never come so hard. I've never been more thankful for anything. I've never loved Theo more than I do in this moment.

Love took root in me before I learned its name, and I've sat in its shade for so long now without eating its fruit. This feels as if I've finally taken a piece into my hands and split it open. It's so sweet inside.

Sour too, slightly underripe—but so, so sweet.