.|. Arizona Rain .|.

The sound of the engine is a low humming, deadened by speed. It’s pleasant.
 
Maybe because it’s the only noise I’ve been listening to for more than an hour now, while I’m watching this endless road. At the horizon, beyond the irregular outline of red rocks still hidden in shadows, the faint colors of dawn are chasing each other, placed one upon the other in vague bright lines. In another occasion, I’d find it considerably inspiring.
 
It’s probably still a while before daybreak. Fifteen, twenty minutes? I wouldn’t bet on it.
 
I sigh, softly, and cover the whole length of the steering wheel with my fingers. Never a night had seemed to me as long as this one. Absurdly long. Just as absurd is being here, now, in an undefined point between Phoenix and Los Angeles, driving through Colorado desert at five o’clock in the morning. With this weird feeling on me, under my skin, of tiredness and confusion combined with… anger, I think. Or something really similar. Jealousy?
 
Oh my God… there, I thought it. Again.
 
I wipe a hand across my face, nervously rubbing my eyes. It’s just that… it’s annoying. And exhausting. And even if I’m miles away, I really can’t calm down…
 
I roll down the window a little. It’s not hot yet, but I need to do something. Oh, damn.
 
“Orli?”
 
I call him, in a low voice. Not a very persuaded one, to be honest. I waited to wake him up because of that, too. Because I wanted to think. I mean, I needed to think. About what to tell him, how to tell him… I don’t even know about what. Damn. Anyway, that was two hours ago and I didn’t manage to rough up a sentence that sounded even remotely logical. Me, who has always found words for everything, I now don’t have the slightest idea of how to behave…
 
What the hell is wrong with me?
 
This isn’t the usual Viggo Mortensen. It really isn’t.
 
I shrug my head, and while I settle down in the car seat I throw another swift look at Orlando, peacefully curled up in the passenger seat. Nothing, he’s still sleeping. Oh, well… maybe it’s better this way, then.
 
I go back to watching ahead of me, starting to believe that he’ll keep sleeping till Los Angeles, but right at that moment I notice a slight movement out of the corner of my eye.
 
“Mhh…”.
 
He’s stretching out his arms. He raises his forehead from the glass.
 
I swallow, readying myself to hearing questions I won’t be able to answer. Maybe.
 
“I thought you would have slept through the whole journey...”, I say, trying to keep a neutral tone.
 
He stays silent for a little while more, then, finally, pulls himself up.
 
“What a… headache…”, he groans slurring, bringing a hand to his forehead. “What time is it?”.
 
“Almost five o’clock”, I answer, carefully avoiding turning around so not to meet his eyes. In particular, I don’t comment on his headache. And then… oh, come on. Vig, you really think he doesn’t remember at all?
 
“You can go back to sleep, if you want to, anyway… well, we still have a long way to go.”
 
He moves his neck, starts looking outside. A minute passes by.
 
“Aren’t you… tired of driving?”, he asks me in the end, voice still sounding hoarse. Thank goodness, I was starting to get worried. I take a deep breath.
 
“No, I’m not sleepy.”
 
“We could take turns.”
 
“I don’t… think it’s a good idea.”
 
There. A subtle hint. Even if Orli could think I was talking about his horrible driving skills, suitable for rally circuits rather than freeways. I mean… maybe he really doesn’t remember, maybe…
 
“Vig, I slept for at least three and a half hours. I slept off the hangover.”
 
Okay, he surely caught the subtle hint. And he remembers.
 
My heart starts beating faster, but I pretend I don’t feel it thrum in my throat.
 
“It doesn’t matter. I said I’m driving.”
 
The voice full of venom didn’t come out on purpose, but I don’t apologize. In fact, it comes to my mind that keeping on the same track isn’t a bad idea, after all.
 
“We could have slept there.”
 
Orli says the sentence sounding almost naive to me. He has turned towards the window again.
 
“I got a call at midnight. I gotta be in L.A. for this afternoon, at the exhibition. There are some problems with the staging”, I mutter. “So I’ll drive you home and then go.”
 
Silence. I focus on the road, trying not to think of any particular presentiment.
 
“You shouldn’t have had any trouble entrusting someone else with that task…”.
 
I close my eyes. I’ll admit it, I kept hoping till the end.
 
“Orlando…”.
 
“… you never rushed anywhere, and you were tired yesterday…”.
 
“Orli…”.
 
“… you said you would have done it at your leisure. The exhibition can go on even without…”.
 
“… fuck, ORLANDO!”.
 
I take a hand off the steering wheel, extending one arm only to slam the fingers back on the soft and black surface. Breathe in. Breathe out.
 
Why does he behave this way, dammit? It would have been so easy to ignore the whole thing. So easy. And obvious.
 
I lift my head, and moving my gaze upon him, I notice that he still hasn’t moved. I know I should stop… God, I know. But I can’t.
 
“You want me to tell you why we didn’t sleep there? You really wanna know? Well, I for sure don’t have any problems since you seem so eager to talk about it. Because we were supposed to get back to L.A. with Karl today, but this morning you almost fucked him. And honestly the idea of the two of you going at it again in the car wasn’t all that appealing. You know how it is”.
 
I said it. I said it?
 
Okay, actually the correct sentence would have been “and if Karl would have kept hitting on you, he wouldn’t have reached L.A. alive”, well, anyway…
 
Viggo Mortensen, you’re a complete idiot.
 
My throat feels dry. I wait.
 
More silence, endless.
 
“Now you’re overreacting”.
 
Orli says those words distinctly pronouncing every syllable.
 
“You know Karl has never hidden what he thought about me during all these years. This morning he was drunk, and… well, fuck, I don’t know why but I let him kiss me. It happened, period. Now you want to tell me that you’re shocked? That Karl’s a pervert? Or maybe that I am?”.
 
“No. I’m just saying that you let him, that Karl’s reckless and that you were showing off in a place where half of the people knew us”.
 
I grit my teeth. You let him. You let Karl.
 
You let him, Orlando. You let him. You let him, you let him. You let him, DAMMIT.
 
But I’m not satisfied yet. Oh, no.
 
“For God’s sake, you really want all the journalists in the world to start that kind of rumors around you?”, I yell. “And then… well, it didn’t really look like you were restraining yourselves to mere kissing”.
 
I hear him sigh. I know he’s getting angry. I, on the contrary, am turning into a full time idiot.
 
This conversation is wandering on a dangerous path. God, now I’m the one feeling drunk…
 
“What didn’t you understand of what I’ve told you?!”, he starts again, raising his voice. “It happened. I was blasted. And then… what do you bloody care? You could have left me there and gone back alone. If I was being such a bother, you could have left me there. With Karl, and the journalists rushing to get a picture of us”.
 
An instant goes by, in the frigid silence. And I feel a shiver go through me, just as icy. Jesus Christ, Orli…
 
He doesn’t have the slightest idea of how much I’d like to tell him. Of how much I care.
 
Because he was clear-headed enough to understand what he was doing, on that fucking couch.
 
Clear-headed enough to remember everything perfectly, now. Exactly… like I do.
 
Unbuttoned shirt, hot face. Dark and fine hair plastered to his golden skin.
 
The pants. Low-riding. Leaving nothing to imagination.
 
Not to mine… nor Karl’s. Karl, who was touching him.
 
I increase the pressure of my fingers on the driving wheel.
 
God. God.
 
You… let him.
 
“And since we’re talking about it… we could have flown there. But no, you insisted on undergoing twice seven *poetic* hours in a car. You and your artistic self-injuring spirit”.
 
I pull myself together, even if his voice sounds distant. Very distant. I move my eyes to the car mirror and I bite down on my lower lip. Is he changing subject?
 
First he insists on me describing the feelings of my wonderful mood at dawn, five o'clock in the morning, making me talk about a couple of things I would have gladly avoided, and two minutes later he treats me as if I were a complete stranger...
 
My mentor, he used to tell the journalists. One of the people I will forever be bonded to...
 
Oh, dammit. I can't... demand anything of him. I can't expect him to think about me the same way.
 
But I kept hoping. Always.
 
In New Zealand, on set, at the premieres. And every time that I got him involved in my world, watching him be awed and enthusiastic about things that are normal for me. Always.
 
I can’t explain where it started from, how it started, but regardless to the years separating us I… God, yeah, I desperately longed for him. In every single moment since I’ve met him. Obviously, not only at a physical level, even if… fuck, all the times I dreamt of pushing him against the walls of some set or on the side of some New Zealand hill, during the first months. To take him hard and fast, in secret. Pulling down his costume leggings, and grasping his arousal in my hands. Basking in the enraptured expression of his face, overtaken by pleasure…
 
It feels like my mouth is starting to bleed. I stop pressing my teeth on my skin, but a vague coppery taste reaches my throat anyway. Breathe, Viggo. Breathe.
 
Yeah, maybe I’d better calm down. If Orli notices it, I certainly couldn’t justify the sudden bulge in my groin telling him I was just imagining him moan in one of my usual erotic fantasies about him. Mmh, it’s better if I say some other lie. Or better, half-truths.
 
“Well, excuse me if I think of you as a dear friend. Is it so weird that I want to spare you a great deal of trouble?”, I say, controlling the voice that would otherwise quiver. A dear friend, I repeat in my mind. Mph. I take a break. “Thank goodness I dragged you away from there. And then… well, I promised Kate I would have brought you back to her safe and sound by tonight”.
 
I feel a sharp pain in my chest just pronouncing that name, but I do it just to try and get as far away as possible from the risky subjects. God, I’ve got too big an headache to put up with all of this. Couldn’t I had banged him on the head when he woke up?
 
He doesn’t say anything, though. He just slides forward in his seat, crossing his arms on his belly, covered only by a thin grey T-shirt. We stay silent. The sun, on my left, is by now half on the horizon. A truck passes beside us, surpassing us and disappearing from our sight in a short time.
 
“Are you going to tell?” he says after a while, breaking again the ceaseless and monotonous noise of the engine. The question doesn’t sound arrogant, but fearful.
 
“What?”, I burst out, nervous. He opens his arms.
 
“What. What do you think?”.
 
“Mph. Five years and apparently you still don’t know me…”, I say, rolling my eyes and pulling my lips in a bitter smile. “Of course I’m not going to tell. I just told you I’m worried about the press. I’ve always granted as few interviews as possible, and you…”.
 
“I’m not talking about the press. I’m talking about the guys. About Kate”.
 
“Oh. Well, it’s exactly the sam…”. I stop, suddenly turning to him. “You really think I could go and tell that to your fiancée?”.
 
“Well, no… no. It was… it was just to…”.
 
“And then, if you break up the press really wouldn’t have anything for the rumor mill. No juicy news from the star-of-the-moment for the teenagers all around the world who are crazy for him”, I go on, sarcastic. “Unless, of course, you wouldn’t want ‘Karl Urban’ to replace ‘Kate Bosworth’ next to your name, in the articles…”.
 
I speak sarcastically, yeah. And with a little bit of wickedness, too. But I’m not surprised anymore. The usual, wise, well-balanced and understanding Vig has left this body many hours ago, now…
 
Orlando doesn’t say anything. And I don’t turn around.
 
“Really, you just have to say it, and I run to Kate at once. In less than two days you can be sure that the whole world will know about the new, shocking relationship of sex-symbol Orlando Bloom with his former co-star, who played Èomer in Peter Jackson’s trilogy…”.
 
I pour those words out upon him, I pour them out without stopping, and I hate myself. I hate myself. Just as much as I hate Kate, as I hate Karl… oh fuck, no, I don’t hate them. Or maybe I do. Because they, at least, had the courage to show him their feelings. How much they wanted him.
 
“See? I care about your career and your love life”. I rest my left elbow on the car door, supporting my head with my hand while the other one keeps steering the wheel. “You should just thank me”.
 
Silence.
 
“Are you done?”.
 
Orli’s voice is just a whisper mumbled under his breath.
 
“I know you don’t like Kate. You could have avoided telling me again like this”.
 
“I’m not the one who should like her. But I’ve got nothing against her, as I have already explained.”, I say. “It just bothers me how your manager keeps exaggerating your story. It’s… commercial”.
 
“You know it doesn’t depend on me”.
 
“It does depend on you. You still have your life in your hands, dammit. And instead you let yourself be dragged around by Hollywood rules. Mph, just like the last famous fish fallen in its golden net…”.
 
While I say these words, I can feel the security belt getting suddenly tighter. I bring one hand to my shoulder trying to loosen it, but the feeling of suffocation doesn’t disappear. I sigh, exasperated. The sun is getting higher in the sky. I move my gaze to the right, and I notice some dark clouds gathering in front of us.
 
“You weren’t like this, at the beginning”.
 
My last sentence echoes weakly in the car. It’s immediately followed by the roar of a thunder, far away but clear. I see Orlando jump out of the corner of my eye. Maybe he closes his eyes for a moment.
 
“I haven’t… changed, Viggo”, he says slowly, after a few seconds. “I just followed the road I created for myself, and now I’m an actor. A well-known actor. But it was what I wanted. There’s nothing wrong in being famous”.
 
He strokes a hand on his chin, then his lips. Strongly.
 
“I dreamt of that”, he repeats slowly. “And you know it”.
 
“But five years ago the boy from Canterbury I used to know told me another thing, too”, I reply without waiting. I turn around to look at him, and he holds my gaze without turning toward the window, without moving an inch, piercing my eyes with his, instead. Dark, but as bright as little wet ebony and sand stones. So alive, and wonderful even when full of rage. Even when they can’t understand me.
 
“…that is to say, that he wouldn’t let himself be taken over by the American star system…”, I go on, going back to look at the road, defeated. “…that he would have kept his feet on the ground. That he wouldn’t have done something to regret”.
 
I don’t dare turning around. But the tone Orlando uses right after is enough to let me guess which expression is on his face.
 
“Oh, so now you think I’m just like the others? That I’m at the same level of those who care only about money and business?!”, he exclaims, nervous. “Great. Really. You’ve put a label on me analysing the shares of my fee, and condemned me for something I haven’t done yet but you’re sure I will, isn’t it?”.
 
He waits a few seconds. He is gasping.
 
I cowardly don’t answer. He turns around again. Suddenly.
 
“Let’s hear, how long have you been thinking that about me? No, really, I’m very curious… I was actually wondering why you kept avoiding me, lately. Why you refused all my invitations to come visit me on set, even if we hadn’t seen each other in months”.
 
“Orlando, that’s not what I meant…”, I manage to say in a very faint voice. Pathetic, I say to myself. It was better if you shut up…
 
“I’m sorry if I’m not that naive and reckless just-out-of-theatre-school little boy anymore”, he interrupts me, harsh. “The Orlando Bloom who used to throw himself out of a flying chopper risking to kill himself every time”
 
“Stop it. You haven’t understood anything. It’s not…”.
 
“Or maybe it’s because of what happened tonight? You saw me on that sofa with Karl and now you think it’s not going to be long before I shag loads of colleagues, producers and directors just to… I don’t know, have new roles, am I right?!”.
 
He’s yelling. Fuck.
 
“No. I never said that. You’re doing everything by yourself”.
 
“Yeah, right…”.
 
“Come on. It wasn’t the first time you lost control in this kind of situation, and what’s more this time you… decisively reached your limit. It’s that…”. I search for words. Desperately. I sigh. “…Good heavens, you’re never careful, you’re not… responsible at all! In spite of always being told the same things, you…”.
 
I stop again. I bend an arm, running my fingers through my hair.
 
“And, you know what?”. I stare at him. “I liked that little boy from the English countryside much better, the one that went bungee jumping without Peter’s consent, in New Zealand! At least he used to listen to the people who worried about him, sometimes. And even if he was reckless, he never forgot who he was. What he believed in”.
 
Orlando returns my look. Sharply.
 
“You can always tell this Orli to sod off, Vig. Nobody’s forcing you to keep being friends with him”.
 
“You’re childish”.
 
“But when it’s convenient for you, you’re okay with it, aren’t you?”.
 
“Mph, and pathetic, too…”.
 
“That’s it. I’ve had enough”.
 
It takes me a while to understand where the music that, all of a sudden, starts to carry through the car is coming from. I’m too shocked about what my mouth has said in the last five minutes, actually. Where I’m driving at, I don’t know. And above all, I don’t have the slightest idea if I’m able to stop.
 
“What the… hell are you doing?”.
 
“I’m listening to the radio”.
 
“We’re talking. Turn it off”, I hiss.
 
Why? Why do I keep using this tone?
 
“We have nothing else to say to each other. And certainly the radio is better than other four hours of conversation with you”.
 
Suddenly, I feel something undefined go through me. I can’t name it, but whatever it is it’s not… pleasant at all.
 
It spreads over my body, biting and fast, like poison. Painful.
 
No, it can’t end this way. I’m not ready to lose him over something… so stupid…
 
Viggo, you have to stop. Now.
 
“You will, instead. I said it’s to be turned off”.
 
And I turn it off.
 
Okay, it is now evident that my brain isn’t communicating with the rest of my body anymore. There’s no other explanation.
 
Orlando stays still for half an instant. He stretches out an arm, turns the radio on. I sigh, and I quickly press again the little key on the electronic screen of the dashboard. The lightened display goes dark again.
 
Another deep sigh. Before I can even bring my fingers back on the steering wheel the last song of some hip-hop singer is reaching my ears. I close my eyes, having now reached my limit. When I open them again and I turn to Orli, he’s staring at me with challenge in his eyes and his lips pressed tightly together.
 
I watch him. I frown, but the moment I start saying something another noise, sudden but soft, catches our attention. We both turn facing the road.
 
Thousands of little water drops are quickly gliding along the transparent surface in front of us, insistently pattering the glass already flooded with rain. I don’t know why, but we spend at least ten seconds staring at the trails trickling down the air-blown windshield, utterly dazed. Luckily I recover fast enough to start the wipers before ending up swerving off the road and making the car roll in the desert. I firmly put both hands on the wheel, trying to slow the beats crazily pounding between my temples. God, thank goodness the road is always straight…
 
I admit it, for a moment I was scared. I’m not one to be distracted while driving. In fact, I’m not one to be distracted in general. Okay, there’s something really weird with me today… maybe I’m possessed by some strange entity and I don’t know it.
 
“It’s raining”, Orlando murmurs in a low voice.
 
I press together my lips, shaking myself from the sight of the car overturned among the rocks with difficulty.
 
“I noticed”.
 
The music, on the radio, stops. A male voice apologizes with the listeners, and passes the line over to the weather forecast. We direct our gazes to the screen above the gear.
 
“A strong perturbation is now affecting Arizona after going through Southern California, last night. Coming from the Pacific Ocean, it will move to north-east, toward New Mexico and Colorado only in the late afternoon. We advice our listeners against traveling this morning, since it’s going to be an intense perturbation, especially in the areas of Phoenix, Mesa and Prescott…”.
 
“Great”, I say, ignoring the rest of the announcement. “That’s what we needed,  I’d say”.
 
Orli leans forward. He tries to look at the sky. I don’t think he can see much.
 
“Maybe it’s better if we stop somewhere”, he says then, resting his back on the seat. “The radio says so, too. I don’t think we should go on if half a downpour is coming”.
 
I throw a quick glance his way, tempted to give him a rude answer. If he’d given me the time, I would have proposed the same thing. I pull my right hand off the wheel for a moment, and get down a gear. You’re behaving like a child, Vig. And you say he does…
 
“Mph. Wanna bet we’re miles away from the next motel?”, I mutter.
 
“You’re such a pessimist. I don’t think so”, Orli answers, calm. “Wait, when we left from L.A. I had put in the dashboard a guide of the…”. He opens the little door in front of him, and smiles triumphantly. “Here it is! ‘Complete guide to the roads of Arizona State’. Perfect. Now I’ll try to find some information on petrol stations, or something like that…”.
 
“Such a prevident guy…”, I say, sarcastic. That’s enough, all this tension isn’t good for me. And then, hell… I don’t want to keep arguing with him. Even if arguing is better than telling him things I would regret for sure, later…
 
I close my eyes, and I take the another long breath. It would be the perfect day to confess him everything. Really. But I probably wouldn’t be able to help myself. And I’d only end up ruining everything. Well, actually I’m already on the right track, for that…
 
“Hey!”, Orlando suddenly exclaims, cheerful. “What did I tell you? Not even forty miles from here, a couple of hours away from the border, there’s a motel. We should be there in forty minutes top, I think”.
 
“Mhh”. I focus on the movement of the wipers. “Great”.
 
Silence, and the hypnotic pitter-patter of the rain. A slight movement from Orli, toward me.
 
“How many times do you plan on repeating that?”.
 
I change the radio station. I leave it on a Neil Young song. I turn down the volume.
 
“What?”.
 
“Great”.
 
I don’t say anything. He watches me, and keeps doing it for the following ten minutes.
 
“What’s the matter?”, I ask him in the end, losing my patience and turning around.
 
“Nothing. I was thinking about something”.
 
“Let’s hear”.
 
“About… well, this situation reminds me of when we spent a whole night on Mount Egmond”, he murmurs. “In the Northern Island. At… the end of principal photography. We wanted to go on a road trip…”.
 
“… and we ended up snowbound because of that sudden blizzard”, I conclude straight away. My lips stretch in an easy smile, and the nervousness disappear. Unexpectedly. God… that night. “Yeah. But that time there weren’t any motels in the surroundings”.
 
“True”.
 
I look at Orlando. He’s smiling, too. He’s smiling at me. In a way… I haven’t seen in a long time.
 
“We spent the whole time in the car”, he goes on, gently. “Even with the heating on, it was incredibly cold”.
 
“And when the engine went out and I couldn’t switch it back on, we moved in the back seat…”, I intervene again. I bring my gaze back on the road, and half-close my eyes. “We waited for the dawn holding each other to avoid freezing to death. Even if… well, honestly, I have to admit to thinking more than once that they wouldn’t have find us. Remember? Even the cells were out of range”.
 
I laugh, and I notice Orlando staring at me with a corner of his mouth lifted upward, lost in memories.
 
“Or that they would have find us huddled up in the back seat the next morning, stiff and frozen like hams in a refrigerator cell…”.
 
He bursts out in a loud laughter.
 
“A beautiful image, nothing to say about it”.
 
“Yeah. The last scene in a drama novel, or in one of those movies when, at the end, they find the dead lovers’s bodies twined in a last embrace…”.
 
Only pronouncing those last words I understand what I have… unintentionally hinted to. I clench my fingers on the surface of the steering wheel, bracing myself for a long, awkward silence. Orli, though, doesn’t seem to be worried about it at all, on the contrary he laughs again. I sigh, then, relived. Why should he be worried, in fact? Probably it was only me that did nothing but think about his body pressed against mine. Motionless in the darkness, while I watched our breaths turn into evanescent clouds of steam with every word we whispered, I remember I even thought that I had had enough, even too much, of what I had been dreaming for months. That unaware embrace would have been enough. And that even if I had died before dawn, it wouldn’t have mattered all that much…
 
The rain is coming heavier, now, but not violent, luckily. Beyond the windshield I see only a grey misty curtain, covering a road with ever-fading sides. The sky is almost totally cloudy, but oddly there is still a sliver of sun shining through at south-east.
 
Surreal, I think while I watch it. And for a few moments, even if I’m sit down, I feel like I’m unsteady on my feet.
 
“We spoke… of the future. Of our future after the trilogy”.
 
Orlando’s voice fades away, while saying the second part of the sentence. As if he’s afraid of shouting, or of overpowering the incessant sound of the rain.
 
“You… told me you had never met a young actor with such a passion and such a talent. That I was a revelation. And that soon everyone would have realised that”, he goes on in a low voice. He slowly turns toward me, but I can’t take my eyes off the white line in the middle of the road. “I haven’t forgotten it… in all these years. Never. You were the first one to believe in me. And if I arrived where I am now, it’s mostly thanks to you. Even if you may have stopped believing it, you have really been my mentor. You still are”.
 
For a second, just for a second, I feel guilty. I also feel some vague happiness, but just as it grazes me, it disappears with the same impalpable lightness, immediately. A little smile appears. The slightest bending of lips, that comes unbidden. Bitter.
 
Why suddenly… I feel this lump in my throat?
 
“Hadn’t you declared we had…”. I swallow. With difficulty, great difficulty. “… nothing else to say to each other?”.
 
Orli folds the guide, which he still holds in his hands, lowering his gaze on his fingers. Waits. The rain keeps flooding down the car, and its sound joins the radio, fragmentary and distant, to fill the silence left by my shaking voice.
 
“There was still… something else”, he murmurs in the end. He rolls up the book a few times, unfolds it, turns it around. I don’t know which expression he has on his face. And I’m not sure I want to know. “But Vig…”.
 
Hearing him say my name that way, shortened and not followed, this time, by another harsh or bitter sentence, is enough to remind me of the first years. When Orlando always, every single time, called me Vig. When he was peaceful, reckless, passionate, naive, curious. When… well, he was simply Orli. And the two of us just Orli and Vig, without spotlights or red carpets to accompany our steps…
 
I half-close my eyes. He starts talking again, anticipated by the flash of a lightning that, for an instant, floodlight the grey road.
 
“… the days in New Zealand… they won’t come back anymore. Nor will the dreams of that time”.
 
His voice, this time, sounds near to cracking, but maybe I’m wrong. Perhaps it was only the crackling of the thunder that, roaring in my ears, overpowered his words…
 
“Probably… I’m not the Orlando you hoped I’d be. In fact, I’m not… even the person I dreamt I’d be…”. He checks his voice, lowers it. “… someone… like you…”.
 
The sliver of sun is still there, broken in half by the edge of a dark cloud. Its outline, though, is a bright gold.
 
And again, that dizziness…
 
“Orli, I don’t…”.
 
The sentence is stuck in my throat. The halo of light that surrounds the dark blanket at the horizon shines, challenging the storm-laden clouds. I see it, out of the corner of my eye. It blinds me, and burns my eyes.
 
“After all… you are right, you know? I disappointed you, Vig. I know I’m just another Hollywood puppet. A boy who loves the fame he conquered, who happily counts all the magazines he appears in every week and who accepts with no trouble at all that his manager pairs him with a cheap actress who needs him for a little publicity…”.
 
“Orli… no, stop it…”.
 
“… only for money. A sodding idiot that goes to each A-list party just so that they can take pictures and he can meet producers that might get him new roles. A twat that can only ends his nights blasted and almost getting shagged by the first bloke that…”.
 
“… STOP IT, I SAID!”.
 
Suddenly, the glass of the windshield gets dangerously near, while I’m lacerated by a very sharp pain in my chest. I manage to see Orli grab the door and be lifted from the seat for a moment, restrained by the safety belt, just a second before closing my eyes. Only when both of us fall again against the car seats, the last echoes of the harsh noise made by the tires on the wet concrete reaches my ears.
 
I raise my eyelids. Breathing hard, I stare at the center of the steering wheel, realising I’m squeezing it in my grip. I can’t move my hands. My right foot, instead, is still pressed down on the brake. I slowly move my gaze beyond the hood, keeping my shoulders bent, tight. The car stopped at the edge of the road, really close to where the concrete ends to be replaced by the red dust of the desert. Beyond the greyish line of the lane, an almost ten feet fall makes me swallow. Noisily. A sharper sudden turn and we would have taken a nice dive.
 
I blink a couple of times, and only when this dreadful thought strikes me I turn toward Orli. He’s sunk in the car seat, near the door, with a hand on the little leather-lined arm-rest and the other one open on his leg. He’s staring at me with wide and glossy eyes. Full of unshed tears.
 
I bite down on my lip, looking at him without being able to utter a word. Under my eyelids, I feel some prickling, too.
 
“You…”.
 
He raises himself up a bit, leaning on his arm.
 
“… you… are so much more than… than that, fuck…”.
 
It’s the only thing I can think about. And that I can say. I wonder if Orlando will understand I’m talking about what he said earlier and I move my head, going back to stare at the road.
 
Now, it’s still. Final.
 
“And you haven’t disappointed me. You could never… never do it”, I add, gasping. I watch the rain come down with almost glassy eyes, feeling more detached by the minute. My arms, and my fingers grasping the wheel, are still shaking. But it’s almost as if I didn’t feel them like part of me anymore, as if I weren’t here. Not in this body, anyway. As if… I were looking at me from outside. And I were shaking my head at the myself in the car. With disapproval.
 
Really… do you want to go on this way? Hurting so bad… for him?
 
That’s what I would tell myself. Yes… probably, I’d only ask myself that.
 
“And… what am I, then, Vig?”.
 
Orli’s voice reaches my ears. Weak, broken, exhausted. Imploring.
 
But I don’t turn around. I can’t… turn around.
 
‘Cause if I really had died, this time, I would never have forgiven myself.
 
He is right. It’s not like five years ago, in New Zealand on Mount Egmont.
 
This… all of this, is not enough. This time, it’s not enough anymore.
 
I close my eyes. I open them again.
 
Tears are running down my face.
 
“Vig…?”.
 
I unbuckle the seat belt. Throw open the door. Get out of the car.
 
The sudden feeling of water on my skin makes me shiver, but it’s what I want. What I need. I quickly walk around the car, passing in front of the lit headlights, and I stop just a couple of inches away from the edge of the slope. I raise my face to the sky. Gradually I feel my shirt cling to my skin, while rain drops, light, keep running down my neck. I collect them in my hands, then I bring my wet fingers to my cheek. Through my hair.
 
God… I can’t take it anymore.
 
But behind me, suddenly, a noise. The door slams. And his voice, again.
 
“We have to… we have to go to the motel. We can’t stop”.
 
Another thunder roars in the sky, but I don’t react to it. I keep my hands on my forehead and take long, deep breaths, and only after a few seconds I manage to lower my arms. I put them on my hips, staring at the concrete.
 
“In… a minute”, I murmur flatly.
 
Behind me, only the falling rain. Then, a barely audible whisper.
 
“I’m sorry”.
 
I close my eyes, bending my lips a little.
 
“It’s not you fault we went off the road, Orlando. It’s mine”.
 
“I wasn’t… I wasn’t talking about that”.
 
“About what, then?”.
 
“About everything… else”. A short pause. “About me, and about you”.
 
A shiver runs across my back, but I know it’s not caused by the rain. And if my sight is dimmed it’s just because of the water that soaks my face…
 
“You are a great actor, Orlando. I thought so five years ago, and I still do”, I try to say without my voice breaking. “Just as I think you are a good guy, and a dear friend. Who doesn’t have to be like anyone. We just lost touch of each other, and I’ve been a little nervous these last few hours, that’s all. So forget… forget all the bullshit I’ve said. Really”.
 
Great Vig. Excellent job. Exactly what…
 
“It’s not what you meant”.
 
My eyes widen.
 
“Tell me what the matter is. Seriously. If it isn’t because of what… I’ve become in Hollywood, then what for?”.
 
I press my hands on my hips.
 
“I told you… there is nothing else”.
 
“I want to know, Vig. I’m not going to… risk losing your friendship without even knowing why!”, I hear him burst out in anger. “I don’t want to meet you next time being afraid of finding again in your eyes what I saw this morning. Whatever… whatever it is about”.
 
My arms go limp at my sides. I slowly start turning around, aware of having reached the point of no return. But it was you who wanted to, Vig, I say to myself. You.
 
The headlights of the car violently pierce the greyness of the air, showing the water drops that, heavy and perpendicular to the ground, are chasing each other fast till they shatter on the road. A few footsteps away from the bright beams, still and with tired-looking dark eyes, Orlando is watching me. The wavy locks of his thick brown hair are now sleek, unruly, stuck to his nape and his wide forehead because of the rain that, by now, has them soaked through. The T-shirt is sticking to his perfect body like a second skin, outlining the profile of his chest with almost geometrical precision, while the baggy dark pants are hanging heavily from his angular hips, dripping water.
 
I stare at him for a moment, enraptured. And clenching my fists I find myself swallowing more than once, just to try and not to think about how wonderful he is, and beautiful, and astonishingly sensual. I open my lips slightly searching for air while, on his left, the light of the sliver of sun suddenly increases in intensity thanks to a shifting cloud, and caresses his sad face with its golden halo. Dimly.
 
“Orlando…”.
 
He tilts his head, dejectedly raising his brows.
 
“What for… Vig?”, he repeats.
 
I swallow again. The rain is coming heavier now.
 
“… the truth is… I can’t bear to look at you surrounded by all… all of them”, I admit then, ignoring the violent and biting touch of water drops on my skin. “By Kate, by… by your manager and by all… those actors and… actresses…”.
 
I take a few steps forward. Orli’s gaze on me is turning inquiring.
 
“… and I hate leafing through a magazine, in the morning… or turning on the TV, surfing on the Net just to find out that… you are at the other end of the world to shoot a new film. When… nobody informed me. When nobody told me”.
 
I stop and take a deep breath.
 
“When… you didn’t tell me”.
 
He keeps watching me, getting more and more confused.
 
“That is the reason?”, he says, raising his voice to be heard over the sound of the rain. “I don’t… think I have really understood. I hope you’re kidding, because I really don’t…”.
 
“It’s exactly what I’ve said”.
 
“But… Vig, honestly…”. He brings a hand to his forehead, moving back the hair fallen to his eyes. He goes back to looking at me. “… maybe… I mean, maybe only my mother knows where I am all the time! And the others, too… the guys, and…”.
 
“That’s the point. I am not the others”.
 
I say that without thinking about it. I say that, and I don’t think of the consequences.
 
“I don’t want to be… like the others, for you”, I repeat again. I look at Orlando in the eye, catching complete confusion in his liquid irises, maybe embarrassment. I have no idea what he’s thinking, but I don’t care. I keep watching him without averting my gaze and after a while he opens his mouth slightly. Swallows. He tries to say something, then thinks about it and stops. He looks at his feet. Lifts his head, at last. Suddenly.
 
“You can’t… ask me something like this”, he utters barely moving his pale lips. His sparkling eyes, amidst the rain drops, are reduced to cracks surrounded by long dark lashes. “Because I can’t… grant you that. It’s not in my power to”.
 
I take another step forward. I don’t stop staring at him, but Orlando smiles. He slowly shakes his head then smiles.
 
With those bright and sad beams watching me. So sweetly.
 
“You can’t keep a check on me, Viggo”.
 
This time, his words sound clear to my ears. He has spoken them in a loud, clear voice, pronouncing them slowly and distinctly. Without making them sound rough, but caressing them gently. I wonder if there’s regret in his melancholy tone, together with something he’s not able to explain to me if not with silence. In my mind I ask myself that more than once, while I move toward his slender shape, sharply outlined against the road.
 
“Viggo…?”.
 
He moves his face, opens his mouth, closes it. Fast streams are trickling down his face, dripping from his chin.
 
And between me and him, just an invisible wall of water, light and air. So fragile, now, to pull apart.
 
I move first a foot, then the other. Another time, then again, quickly. The few inches that separated us are suddenly non-existent, and in a second I find myself squeezing his shoulders. Feeling his tense body, made sensitive by the rain, adhere to mine. Mine, that presses him against the car door with such violence and such possessiveness I didn’t believe I had it in me.
 
“And instead… I want to do it…”, I whisper in his ear, lightly stroking his wet locks with my cheeks. “… because I want you to… be only mine, Orlando. Only… under my control…”.
 
I breathe in his scent, and I barely move. Just enough to be a breath away from his mouth, and press my lips against his. Cold, wet. Without waiting for his reaction to my gesture, to my words, without allowing him a retort. His taste blends with the rain, while a warm shiver runs swiftly across my back. I increase the pressure in his mouth, unable to stop, but when I introduce my tongue, too, he doesn’t push away. Out of instinct, I thrust my pelvis against his, and feeling his arousal another incredibly intense burst of sensations is suddenly coursing through me, forcing me to break away from his lips just to regain my breath. I sigh in pleasure, and only then I become aware of his hands around my waist.
 
I barely open my eyes, still not completely conscious of what I have done, what I am doing, and finally I meet his. Surprised, happy.
 
“Since… since when?”, ha asks in a whisper, frowning with half a smile on his face.
 
I stare at him for a while, then I return the same ironic bend of lips.
 
“Since the beginning. Immediately”.
 
Silence, lasting very briefly.
 
“I can’t…”, he whispers against my chin, starting to laugh. “… I can’t… I can’t believe it…”.
 
He leans his head against mine and I can’t help myself, I join him, still hugging him close to me.
 
“We’re two idiots…”.
 
I frame his face in my hands and our laughter, cut off by little kisses, can be heard over the pelting rain that keeps falling. We laugh for a long time without stopping until, together, we lower our voices. We look at each other, then we go back to kissing, gently at first, then with more and more passion. We leave the car behind us and start drawing back, forgetting about the slope a few feet away. Only when I feel the sudden empty space under my foot I try to push Orlando toward the road, but I slip on the earth, turned to mud by now, losing my balance and dragging him along.
 
I roll for at least ten seconds without having the nerve to open my eyes, feeling only the steepness of the ground dragging me downwards and Orlando’s body held tight in my arms. When, slowing down, we reach the bottom of the slope we keep still, curled up in the twilight of that little corner of desert as if waiting for something else, or maybe just astonished that it is over so fast. After a while I lift my eyelids and, my heart going a mile a minute, I take a deep breath. Luckily, there weren’t any rocks…
 
“Yes, we really are two idiots…”, I murmur, lifting my head toward the edge of the road beyond which I catch a glimpse of the faint glimmer of the headlights of the car, run through crosswise by the rain. “We risked to die in a very stupid way twice in half an hour. Must be a record”.
 
I sigh again, but my thoughts immediately go back to Orli. I lower my eyes on him, lying on his back and partially covered by my legs.
 
“Are you okay?”.
 
Orlando stares at my worried gaze, then bursts out laughing again.
 
“Never been better”.
 
I lift a corner of my mouth, relieved.
 
“A little muddy, maybe”, I say, trying to wipe clean one of his dirty cheeks with my fingers but only making things worse. “But real sexy for sure”.
 
He chuckles again. He nears his face to mine, draping his mud-covered arms around my neck.
 
“I absolutely agree…”.
 
Our lips meet again, but after hugging a few times rolling on the red and thick ground beneath us, all of a sudden we stop, interrupted by the deafening roar of a thunder that, together with its lightening, illuminates our entwined bodies on the bottom of the little slope. Orlando sneezes and I burst out laughing.
 
“Mmh… even if the idea is quite tempting, maybe we’d better go on telling each other what we didn’t tell during the last five years once we’re at the motel…”, I say slyly, grazing one of his nipples with my tongue, just to reclutantly move away and lower his soggy T-shirt on his belly.
 
He opens his eyes, staring at me with equal part frustration and embarrassment.
 
“You… you’re right”, he whisper, shivering. In spite of the downpour, the temperature isn’t very cold, but we have surely spent too much time under the water.
 
I draw him to me. We gain our feet with little difficulty and, being careful not to slip, we manage to go back to the car in a few minutes. We get in without saying a word, but once we close the doors and I turn the key in the ignition, a sputtering croaking suggests the worst of situations.
 
“Run-down battery”, I state. I look at Orlando and shrugging I wink. “Any doubts, by chance?”.
 
He laughs in reply.
 
 
*
 
 
“Anyway, fighting for a few more years wouldn’t have been so bad…”.
 
Orli raises his face to the sky, pushing back the long dark locks for the thousandth time. He turns around to watch me, and an ironic smile appears on his lips.
 
I glare at him fondly. I try to find a better position for the duffel bag on my shoulders, then we both bring our eyes back to the horizon, looking for the ever-nearing motel. Even if it’s after six there’s no one around, and the lanes are completely empty. Loaded with luggage and soaked through while walking on the side of a freeway in the middle of the desert at dawn, we probably look like two hitch-hikers coming through a most unfortunate night. But without a doubt this isn’t our case. This isn’t mine. For me, actually, this is the luckiest night of my life. And the most wonderful one.
 
“Now, though, I want to know”, Orli says all of a sudden, shaking me from my thoughts. I turn around, opening my mouth without understanding.
 
“What?”.
 
“If you were jealous. Of Karl”.
 
For a moment, I stare at his eyes, full of mischief, then I slowly shake my head.
 
“Oh, no… don’t tell me…”.
 
“Oh, yeah…”.
 
“You little…”.
 
I drop the suitcases on the street in order to throw myself at him and take my revenge with a few seconds of cruel and ruthless tickling. I immobilize his arms with one hand, while the other is around his waist. I kiss him on the neck and he throws his head back to rest on my shoulder. We chuckle.
 
“So, you did it just to see if I was jealous…”.
 
“Well… no, not really. It was desperation, more than anything else”, he explains. He releases himself from my embrace and, purposely not looking at me in the eye, picks up his bag. “It’s just that… I was practically sure you didn’t return my feelings. I mean… all those years and nothing had ever happened between us. And I surely didn’t fool myself these last few days when… we met again. But… maybe, deep inside me… well, I kept hoping. Or I felt it, who knows?”. He smiles at me. “Anyway, that’s why I decided to get blasted yesterday night, and to let myself get carried away with Karl. I was feeling really low, I assure you. And this morning you weren’t the only one to have reached their limit”.
 
I clench and unclench my fists a few times and take long, deep breaths to forget what I’ve seen the night before. Control, Viggo. Control. Remember that if it wasn’t for Karl probably nothing would have happened, on this road trip…
 
“Mmh, you know I will still have to kill our dear colleague for daring to make a pass at you, right?”.
 
Ha stares at me, shocked, and I burst out laughing.
 
“I’m kidding”, I go on with a smirk. Maybe, I add in my mind. I pick up the suitcase and I start walking again. “But what I said when… I kissed you, back at the car, it’s true”.
 
His expression, pouting and ironic, changes. It becomes relaxed, and sweet.
 
“I want you to be under my control. Want to be… with you, always. Even when you are away”, I murmur softly, looking at him in the eye. “To be your first thought, and your last, every day”.
 
He stops again. The clouds have covered the last gleam of sun, at est. But even if the whole Arizona state woke up in a grey and gloomy morning, this little, tiny corner of wet concrete feels brighter than a hundred summer days. And the sky above us clear and blue.
 
We stare at each other without saying a word, while the rain keeps falling. It hasn’t decreased in intensity, but heaven knows why it feels so light. Gentle.
 
We smile. And after a few moments, together, we turn around.
 
The motel is 300 feet away, just visible through the veil of water. We exchange one last glance, and, still grinning, we quicken our pace.
 
 
 
“Welcome. What can I do for…”.
 
The receptionist, until that moment bent over the papers scattered under him, raises his gaze. He looks us up and down, then stands there gaping.
 
Standing a few steps away from the hall, drenched to the bone, dripping and completely covered in dirt and mud, Orlando and I drop everything to the ground. In a second, a sizeable puddle is forming around our luggage, spreading out on the pastel-colored floor of the little room,
 
“We’d like a room. Double”. I specify, showing off my friendliest smile. “Please, your best one”.
 
The other blinks a couple of times, finding it hard to close the curiously heart-shaped little mouth.
 
“Ce… certainly, sirs”, he stutters, turning around to mechanically search for a key among the ones hanging from a wall behind him and slowly putting it on the counter. “And how long… will you be staying?”.
 
I quickly steal a glance at Orli. The curve of his mouth takes on an eloquent crease, while his half-closed eyes are smiling along with his lips. I turn back toward the owner.
 
“Oh, we really like Arizona. I believe… mmh, maybe even a couple of weeks. Or three. You know, the desert is wide to visit on foot”.
 
The man widens his eyes, astonished.
 
“Excu… excuse me?”.
 
I wave an arm, and laugh.
 
“Oh, don’t worry… and don’t make that face”, I reassure him, bringing my other hand around to the back pocket of my soggy pants to slip out a wallet in the same exactly state. I put it on the counter causing a funny, dull, watery noise. I smile again. “We’re paying with the credit card. In advance”.
 
 
THE END