The Puppets Theater

THE PUPPETS THEATER 6

USUAL DISCLAIMER

"THE PUPPETS THEATER" is a gay story, with some parts containing graphic scenes of sex between males. So, if in your land, religion, family, opinion and so on this is not good for you, it will be better not to read this story. But if you really want, or because YOU don't care, or because you think you really want to read it, please be my welcomed guest.

THE PUPPETS THEATER

by Andrej Koymasky © 2019
written on December 16, 1989
Translated by the Author
English text kindly revised by Richard

EPILOGUE
END OF THE SHOW

They went up to the Pellico Street apartment and there Marco, at first with much hesitation, his eyes cast down, making extraordinary efforts to overcome his embarrassment and shame, told Angelo all the truths, all of his life in detail, all that he did to the three men he choose as his victims. When he finished, for a time, it seemed very long to both, there was silence. Both felt like saying a thousand things, but neither of them seemed to find the will to do it.

At last Marco asked with a very thin voice: "Now that you know who I am, what I did, will you abandon me? I sicken you, true?"

"No. But there are yet so many things to say."

"I told you everything..."

"Yes, but... beside knowing, I would like to understand why. I have to understand why all this. I have some ideas, interpretations, but it must be you to explain it me. There must be a reason.

"In Guglielmo, if I'm not wrong, you wanted to punish your father because you saw in him the man who, thanks to the power of his money, of his social standing, wanted to determine, manipulate the life of the others. This seems to me sufficiently transparent and clear.

"But Franco? Why did you drag him so low, debase him? Why did you want to humiliate him to this point? I really can't understand. Franco is a meek man, good, I would say harmless..." Angelo said, and waited anxiously.

"In him I saw all my puritan and respectable educators, in him I saw the teacher that caught me with Herman, in him I saw my law teacher I forced to give me head, who did it and enjoyed it, but who didn't want to admit it to me and not even to himself. In him I saw the society with its false and middle class mentality... Also Franco, if he really wanted, could have opposed me."

"Your law teacher, perhaps, yes. Even if at times fear, embarrassment can take away from you any strength. But with Franco it was different. He was in love with you, so much in love that he could not oppose you. One who is deeply in love, at times, will accept even to be hurt just to please his beloved. It may be wrong, but it is so.

"By the way, you too are risking to lose me telling me all this, to damage yourself, and yet you do it. Why? Because you are in love. With Franco you have been cruel. And I cannot absolutely understand this cruelty. But what amazes me even more, is what you did to Ugo. You deliberately choose a man who never before had any gay experience, tendency or desire. You were made sure through that girl, the detective. You snared, fascinated him to the point to awaken in him, to reveal that gay component that more or less is present in any man, in my opinion. And on this point I think there is not so much wrong in it. After all, at first, you also made him happy. But then, you pushed him to prostitute himself, and you humiliated, debased him. Why? Is it possible that you were not aware of the harm you did him?"

"Ugo was the only one, among these three men I really liked very much. He was a very beautiful young man, and very gentle. And good hearted. And he really was my type. Perhaps you don't believe me, perhaps you can't, but each time I pushed him into the arms of another man, I felt bad, I suffered. Not so with Franco - when I organized those scenes and saw him making love with the other boys, humiliated, used, after all I amused myself. I must admit it, even if now I'm ashamed of it. With Ugo perhaps there was probably some love, even if it does seem strange after what I did him. But when I debased him, I debased myself, to spit on my own sentiments, to refuse the love that I was, in part, feeling for Ugo. When I knew he was having sex with another man, on my request, after I had with difficulty forced him to yield, because he didn't want to, then, I too felt bad. And afterwards, I made love with him with all my tenderness, and that not just to manipulate him better, but almost to ask him to forgive me for using him in that way. But the more I became aware I was falling in love with him, the more I pushed him into the arms of other men.

"At first, it is true, I saw in him, a straight family father, even my father. I wanted to corrupt my father, humiliate him, and with him all the totally straight family fathers who loathe their son's homosexuality, without understanding that they also, under the right conditions, could be gay. But mine was not thirst for justice, it was just greed for revenge. It was just contempt towards love. For all those I met in Milan, who said they wanted to see me again, who made me hope they were falling in love with me, and who instead refused me, disappeared, vanished without even saying good bye... I stopped believing in love, until I met you. But I did these horrible things, I'm now aware of it. Could you ever forgive me?"

"Perhaps. If you can forgive me."

"Forgive you? And for what?"

Now it was Angelo's turn to tell his story. As Marco had, he started from his adolescence, then told him how little by little he discovered his homosexuality, and how he lived it his first time. He told about his falling in love, his adventures, good or bad, his disappointments. He narrated about the episodes he was ashamed of and had never told anybody.

Then, he started to tell about his first meeting with Marco's father and of the task he received from him. How he was responsible, much to his regret, of the end of all the adventure Marco had between his 18th and 22nd years. How he sympathized for him, about how he also tried not to report about his relationships with some of his conquests, but how he failed. Then he told him also about his progressive falling in love, about his desire held back for years, cultivated for years. Also Angelo, revealing to Marco all his story, looked at him, he tried to judge the effect of his words on Marco's face, fearing that the boy would feel anger with him, would feel offended, to be made a fool. And as he concluded, he told him how he did on purpose meet him in the role of Bruno.

Marco listened to him and looked at him seriously. When Angelo concluded his story, Marco asked him: "And you, even knowing all I have done, continue to be in love with me?"

"Certainly. I loved you even if I didn't like what you are doing. I never ceased to hope you could find back yourself and change again. To be once more the adorable Marco I at first knew."

"And now that we finally know each other for who we really are, now that we know everything about each other, what can we do?"

"That's up to you. I love you. I ask nothing of you, and have just my love to offer you, if you want it. It is for you to decide."

"If I found the courage to tell you everything, it is just because I too am in love with you, do you understand that?"

"Yes, certainly."

"Now... I must leave these three men, of course. I want to break with them. Even if you don't want it, I have to stop with them. It has all been like a bad dream, a nightmare from which you helped me to awaken, thank heavens. Don't you think so?"

"You have to think about it, but..."

"But?"

"You can not just throw them away after having used them to your will."

"No, but I can not continue in that way. I have to leave them. I made them suffer so much, don't you think?"

"Yes, I really think so. And now they will suffer again, when you leave them."

"But for the last time, at least because of me. I have to find a way to... to pay compensation for the damage I did to them, if it is possible. And I don't say just in a monetary meaning..."

They talked for a long while.

Then at a some point Marco asked: "Do you feel like making love with me, Angelo? I really feel I need it. I need to feel that, in spite of everything, you still love me."

"Yes, Marco. I would like to be able to make love with 'Marco', at last. With Beniamino, I must admit it, it was very beautiful, but I always felt that it was not really you..."

"You are right. But at this point I have completely bared my soul to you, even if to you I was always naked, without knowing it. Finally I can be just myself... nothing else."

"And then, now strip also your splendid body. What are you waiting for?" Angelo suggested smiling him with playful sweetness to relive somewhat the atmosphere.

"I would like to be you to do it. I like feeling your hands on my body. I want to belong to you, Angelo!"

"And I want to belong to you too, finally, my Marco."

If before, when they made love, always it had been beautiful, now that a new mutual awareness bound them, it was way more beautiful. They both felt it was different, true. That this was their 'first time'. So, finally, they made love. They made it all the night long, without hurry, with passion and tenderness, and dawn caught them still talking, and kissing, their bodies tightly intertwined, and the reciprocal desire that seemed never be sated.

"I was thinking... I must find the way to leave all them three, trying to avoid hurting them too much more. But it is not easy."

"I know. What do you intend to do?"

"I don't know. What do you suggest me?"

"Nothing. It is up to you to decide."

"But you can at least give me some advise, can't you?"

"Gauge what you did, the damage you inflicted, and what you can do for them now, even if you leave them. If you want."

"Perhaps Guglielmo is the one who deserves less consideration. Before meeting me he used his boys more or less as I used him. I'm not saying that it was for me to do that, I don't want to justify myself. But after all he got what he deserved. I paid him back with his same money. And he is the one from whom I took less away. The documents he signed leaving everything to Beniamino Petrucci are still here, I didn't deposit them. So I can give them back, he can tear them, and all will be back like before."

"But perhaps you stole from him the possibility to believe in love... And this is not a little thing, don't you think?"

"This too is true, I didn't consider that. But what can I do, now? This is perhaps the only one thing I cannot give him back. I will write him a letter telling him that I leave him because I am not in love with him. I will explain him that I just made a fool of him..."

"No, I would not do that, in your place."

"Why?"

"Not to be loved by someone you love, is a very hard thing. But to discover to have been mocked by someone we believed was in love with us, is too much even for a cynical person like Guglielmo. You could inflict on him a wound that would never again heal. In my opinion it would not be right, and especially not from you. He never did hurt you, after all."

"You are right, again. Then, I'll simply write him that I became aware I was not really in love with him and that I fell in love with another man, therefore I give him back everything, and I don't want to meet with him any more... Is that better?

"But then there is Franco. He ran heavily into debts for my fault. And he stopped writing the books he desired to publish, always because of me... I forced him to debase himself, to make hardcore videos, to compromise himself... If one of these videos should fall into the wrong hands, his teacher's career would be seriously compromised... So, I thought, I put in his account five hundred millions as a compensation... and I give him that small editorial company I own as Massimo... It's enough that I see a notary and sign a donation act, registering it in his name. So he can write and publish all the books he wants... I know that money doesn't resolve it all, that money is not everything... But honestly I think I cannot do more for him. He was really in love with me... he will suffer..."

"Don't you write a letter, to him?"

"And say what? That I'm sorry? That I was never really in love with him? I think he already knows that, that he always knew, in some ways. He just hoped not to lose me, but this is the only one thing I just cannot give him..."

"Sure, but I'd write to him too. You can at least ask him forgiveness for all you made him undergo..."

"I'll try, if you think it is right. But then there is Ugo. For him, believe me, I'm sorry a lot more than for the other two. To him I have really to write a letter to ask for his forgiveness, if he could ever to forgive me. But what can I give him? The family he lost for my fault? That's impossible..."

"A family, after all, he never had one. Before meeting you he was withering in that semblance of a family, in my opinion. You at least gave him the possibility to dream, to build, to realize part of his dreams. And also to discover an unknown part of his sexuality. Without you he possibly would never have discovered he was gay, and he never would have understood what didn't work with all the women he tried to go with..."

"And now it will be unfair take from him the little I gave him. I can leave him the apartment and the enterprises I started under the name of Massimo and with his help... and I can leave him also a part of the capital so that he has his back covered..."

"How much are you thinking to leave him?"

"In the bank where he worked, I think there are still 80 billions. What do you think if I leave him all of it? The money in the other banks, we can keep for ourselves."

"I'm not interested in your money, Marco. I'm interested only in you. For all that it concerns me, you can leave all your money to Ugo. We will start again from the beginning, you and I, with just our own efforts. But you can do which ever you like better."

"Will you renounce to 300 billions? It is really a lot of money."

"I'm interested just in you, I told you. That money is not mine, therefore I have nothing to renounce, I don't care about it. It is your money, you can do with it as you please."

"Then, what do you think if I leave him all?"

"If it's good for you, it's good for me too."

"All right, I'll leave him all the money. And to Franco 2 billions, so he can live just on the interest. Ugo deserves it. Again, I don't think that I can pay him back with my money the harm I did to him, but I have nothing else to offer him..."

"It costs you dearly having played with his life... And I didn't know how little you cared about money."

"No, I really don't care about money, I never did. Money stole my father from me, money gave him the possibility to ruin my life, and gave me the possibility to do... what I did. I rather hope that it does not cost to Ugo too much. Of the three men, he is probably the one who really loves me. And then, after all, that is not even my money, it was of my father. If we were less rich my life would have been very likely much different. Happily now there is you giving a meaning to my life... But there is one more problem, possibly all three will look for me... I don't want to meet them any more, I would be too ashamed. Therefore I have to leave Turin, but I don't want to leave you..."

"I'll willingly leave Turin. Where would you like to go?"

"Anywhere. I leave to you the choice."

"And what do you think to do for a living, if you give away everything?"

"I don't know. Anything."

"But didn't you dream, as a boy, something you would have liked to do?"

"I had very little dreams, as a boy. Possibly the three characters I acted correspond a little to my dreams. The nobleman who is a manager, the artists who performs concerts, the hustler-director making porno videos and building his career by himself... But I, really don't know what would I like to do? I never dreamed about it, really..."

"Think about it, we will find something. Would you like to move in Bologna?"

"Sure, it is a beautiful city. Now I have to prepare all the changes of property and the letters... but then, do you promise that we will at once leave Turin?"

"Yes, I'll sell my agency."

"You father will say nothing?"

"I don't know, but I have decided. He can't change my decisions."

"Are you really persuaded it is right accepting me as a lover?"

"Certainly yes. And you?"

"Yes. Otherwise, I would not have decided to get rid of all my past in this way. I want a new future with you."

"And what if you are disappointed by me?"

"I'll finally pay for all the bad I did up to now. But, honestly, I hope it never will happen."

"Don't you think now, you're being too severe with yourself?"

"I had to be so before, simply. So I could be less severe with me now."

"You always were a good hearted person, in spite of the three years of madness..."

"Yes, madness, you are right. But thanks to you I'm possibly coming back to my senses."

"I love you, Marco."

"Thank you... you can't know how much I need it."

"Yes, I know. You were looking all these years for somebody to love you..."

"And you were so close by. If only my father had been more understanding..."

"Then we would never have met, don't you think?"

"This also is true... Therefore I cannot even be angry with him..."

"No. In his own way, even if completely nutty, he really loved you..."

"It is hard to believe that. But perhaps you are not wrong. Each of us after all loves as he is able, in his own way..."

Marco, helped and assisted by Angelo, did all as he decided. First of all made all the exchanges of property, then wrote the three letters. He had to write them again and again before feeling satisfied and sending them.

Meanwhile Angelo told his father of his intention to move to Bologna. He didn't want his son to sell the Turin branch, but he took over from his son and gave it to one of his employees to manage. He gave to his son a certain amount of money so that in Bologna he could start something new.

In all these days they lived in a motel just out of Turin, after having destroyed all the files that were in the Silvio Pellico Street apartment, now registered in Franco's name. They had paid a great deal of attention not to leave any hint that could even vaguely connect the three names to Marco.

Then they left for Bologna. While they were traveling on the motorway in Angelo's runabout, Marco gave him all his fake documents: "Destroy them, Angelo, please."

Angelo nodded. They stopped in a rest stop and there he burned them, one after the other. Both remained in silence to watch the fire that was destroying the last ties with the last years.

While they were still on the way, Marco asked of Angelo: "Do you think you'll open a new detective agency, in Bologna?"

"No. My father would have been happy, but I decided to change. You see, I have a dream..."

"Would you tell me?"

"Yes. I would like very much to start an editorial agency for artistic books. Something special. I would like to print very beautiful books, or reproductions of ancient books, and also new ones. First I would make a prototype completely by hand, how it was done in ancient times, for us to keep. Of this I would make ten numbered and signed copies, all by hand, to sell by reservation to rich bibliophiles. Then I would print one hundred more copies, also numbered, in a handcrafted way, for book lovers. Then one thousand luxury editions, than ten thousand commercial copies to sell at a low price... I don't know if I can succeed, but I'll like to try..."

"It's very beautiful. May I work on it with you?"

"Sure, I'll be happy."

"Therefore, your dream can be also mine?"

"But of course."

"Good. You'll see, we will succeed!"

"I hope so. We have just to try."

"Who knows how they will take it?" Marco said changing the subject.

"Who? Ugo, Franco and Guglielmo?"

"Yes."

"I don't know. Past is past. Now let just think to our future."

Angelo and Marco set up in Bologna and started to work on their project. Little by little they found several valuable and skilled craftsmen ready to work with them - illuminators, miniaturists, bookbinders, paper-manufacturers, illustrators, compositors, calligraphers and so on. They spent months in writing essays until they restated some very beautiful texts, that they showed in galleries, exhibitions and also in some specialized magazines that presented them with high praise. So that the orders started to come, and just one year later they started to have a good clientele. The small capital invested by Angelo, thanks also to the skill of Marco in business and the enthusiastic collaboration of the craftsmen, started to yield fairly well.

They had spent one year in serious financial straits, but they didn't feel like it was a burden, as they were happy to be together and to be realizing their dream. Marco had recovered his cheerfulness, and had shown to be really a complete lover, refined, gentle and easygoing at the same time. Angelo felt he was the most happy man in this world.

So came the day when they celebrated the first year of their new life in Bologna.

That day Marco said to Angelo: "I... in Turin didn't tell you all the truth, do you know? There is still one thing that..."

"Ah, really? What did you hide from me? All I already knew, you told me then…"

"Are you upset with me?"

"No. But what is this secret? Did you perhaps left open a way of escape from me?"

"Probably yes. But now I know that I don't need it any more. You see, I left to Ugo all the capital I had in Italy. But I didn't tell you that my father had also another big capital in a secret coded account in Switzerland, a bearer account. And I have the secret number. I never used it. It is really a big capital. Here is the envelope with the secret number of that account, and all the information to access it... It's my present to you. You have to just use it, you can have all the money in your hands. And you can use it as you please. Now really I have no more secrets with you."

"You could keep it, if you wanted. I didn't even suspect its existence."

"I know. But it is right in this way. Even if in the beginning it gave me a security sensation, little by little this last lie started to be more and more heavy to me. It is yours, now. I really have nothing more. I entrust myself completely to you. You are my only security."

"Thank you. Not so much for the money, but for what you decided to do trusting me completely. With this money we could enormously expand our business, to become a big editorial company... But I think I will not use it, at least for the moment. It can remain there. We will see in future how to use it. Our editorial company will grow more slowly, but I think it will give us a bigger satisfaction. But, honesty for honesty, I too have a secret that now I want to reveal you..."

"You have a secret? And what is that?"

"About two months ago, I ordered an investigation on Guglielmo, Franco and Ugo. Would you like to know what happened to them?"

"Yes... very much."

"Guglielmo started again his life exactly like before meeting you. He continues to profit of the boys who go to see him for a job. Not more, not less than before. It seems that he erased you from his life quite rapidly and easily. Are you sorry for that?"

"No, not for me, at least. Possibly a little for him. But I'm not stupefied. I'm sorry for the boys who fall in his hands..."

"However, those who accept, it is because they wants to, because they are happy with that. In fact those who really don't want to surrender to Guglielmo's conditions, have only to refuse his proposal and to look for another agent."

"But he is the best, in spite of how he behaves. He is really a very good agent. And also a handsome man, even if not my type. If he just was not so cynical..."

"Yes. But perhaps, soon or later, he will find the right boy and he will change..."

"You are always an optimist, aren't you?"

"If I wasn't I would have renounced you a lot of times, for the most different reasons..."

"You are right. Luckily you are an optimistic, then."

"Yes. And then I have news about the teacher."

"About Franco?"

"Yes. He looked for you. The woman you paid to pretend to be your mother, told him the truth, at least the part she knew."

"Was he angry?"

"It doesn't seem so. Not with her, anyway. You gave the small apartment where she lived to Ugo, do you remember? Franco bought it from Ugo and gave it to the woman. He printed his first book with the editorial agency you gave him. He stopped teaching and now he writes full time. He also stopped looking for hustlers. He now lives with a boy, a former student of his high school. I don't know where they met and got to know about each other. But now it is seven months that they live together and they seem to fit well. The boy is 22 years old, he is handsome and doesn't resemble you at all. He is his secretary, therefore they live and work together."

"I'm glad. I'm really glad. But... and Ugo?"

"He is the one you care so much, right?"

"Yes, it is so. Probably because he is the one I treated in a worst way, and that deserved it less than the others. How is Ugo, now?"

"It seems to be okay. He too searched a lot for you. He engaged the Turin agency of my father. He didn't find any track of you, in spite of the fact that he spent more than a little money. He continues to care for the business you started with him, and it seems with a good success. He sold the Maria Vittoria apartment where you lived together, and bought another, less wide but beautiful, in Stati Uniti Boulevard. He moved there and kept all the staff in the office, but just the waiter and the driver at home...."

"Who, Cesare and Tony?"

"No, Paolo who does all, from the cooking to the cleaning. With Tony, instead, they have become lovers and they live together."

"He is a handsome boy, Tony. And I think also a good boy, honest, from what I know. Tony liked Ugo very much and tried several times to do it with Ugo, after that famous 'trial' for the hiring. But I know that Ugo never made love with him, in spite he was, I think, the one he liked more of all the eight youths of the staff. And now, for what it seems, Tony succeeded in his desire. I hope they are well, together..."

"It seems so. They go often, together, to the 'Triangolo Rosa' and it seems that neither of them looks for other adventures, therefore I presume the are well together, at least for now."

"So, all ended well, in a certain way."

"At least apparently. It is not easy to tell. The internal wounds, normally, one tries to hide them carefully..."

"But with time and love, they heal. You are healing all my wounds. Amongst all, it seems, I am the most lucky... Even if I didn't deserve it so much..."

"You paid your advanced bill when you were a boy. I think it is time you now that live a little more serenely, isn't it?"

"A lot, not a little. You cannot guess how has been beautiful this last year for me."

"For me too, Love. But we have many more years in front of us. We have to do our best, because it depends mainly on us if they will always be happy years, don't you think? Happiness never comes by itself, it never comes down from the skies, but we must build it day after day, cultivate it."

"When I was a boy, I discovered I was like a puppet in my father's and other people's hands. They pulled the strings, and I had to dance following their script. I didn't like it. I was possibly the best dressed puppet, kept in velvet lined boxes, maneuvered with golden strings... But I felt to be just a puppet. When I convinced myself that I had to escape from my puppeteers... tack! and all went as they wanted. Therefore, when my father died, I wanted at last to play to be the puppeteer. That's why I choose three puppets and manipulated them to my liking. I chose them and little by little I built their strings without them being aware of that, and I ruled them. Finally I felt powerful... but not happy. And now I am aware that I continued to be a puppet - I simply was the puppeteer-puppet. Those strings that I thought I cut, continued to act, invisibly but real. The same script that I wrote for my three puppets, involved me so much it forced me to act in the script also. Even when I first met you, it was the puppet Beniamino who met you, and Marco suffered for that. He wanted to come out of that situation, but he couldn't find the strength. But happily you were there, the real puppeteer... and you cut all the strings, this one time, so Marco could come out to live again..."

"No, Love, I don't think it went quite that way. I too, perhaps have always been a puppet. After all, each of us risks being a puppet and a puppeteer at the same time, while there is no love. But when love comes, then really the show is over and life begins. Love is what transforms any puppet in a being of flesh, with a soul. It is much like in Pinocchio' tale - he falls asleep as a puppet and he wakes up as a real boy. Now at last, you and I have awakened, we are real, we are no more puppets. Because we love each other."

"But if all this is just a dream? If they are just subtler strings, more difficult to see? If we were still following a script?"

"No, I don't think so. But if even it is so, this is the most beautiful script I could fancy, I like it, I want to perform it to its end. If we are acting, following a script that perfectly coincides with what we would like to do, if who pulls our strings pulls them just how we would like to move... Hurray for that script, hurray for that puppeteer, don't you agree?"

"Yes, Love. You know... my puppeteer now says we have to make love..."

"Happily mine says so too. Come..."

THE CURTAIN FALLS

THE END

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