No going back - 33. Holiday

>Where are you?

"In the Piazza dell'Anfiteatro, Caffè dei Romani, sitting in the shade”

>OK, See you in a bit.

"Get some pics?”

>Lots!

Finally, we were in Italy, in Lucca, and had discovered that to have a relaxing holiday, we both needed to compromise and that we didn't have to do everything together. But that doing things together, exploring different things was also part of the fun.

Colin would appear shortly, order an expresso and show me his photographs of what I'd missed. He was walking around the historic walls, again. He found their age, brickwork and the views of the town endlessly fascinating. I just hoped that his Mother, Annalisa or the guys at work didn't expect him to have ordinary holiday snaps. We'd go for a wander later and he'd show me some of his discoveries, he'd be excited about the buildings, their age, history and the architectural detail whilst I'd be curious about what was inside, who lived there, what was it like to live in such historic places.

So far, I'd dragged him, much protesting, into the courtyards of a couple of historic buildings, tempting openings into other worlds, where the glimpsed interior of the courtyard seemed to offer architectural riches far greater than the exterior. That was me being fanciful, but my curiosity was roused whilst Colin would mutter that we couldn’t, we were trespassing.

I hadn't been completely idle, either, I had done a bit of exploring and added to our list of interesting restaurants, the ones that seemed to have regional specialities rather than bulk-standard tourist fare. I had joked that Colin would have to go on a diet when we got back and could have kicked myself as soon as the comment was out. It was the sort of silly, thoughtless jokey retort that meant something entirely different when you had a difficult relationship with your body.

"You really think I need to lose weight?"

"No. Not at all, but I worry about you putting weight on during the holiday and not losing it."

"The next holiday, I put more on?"

"You see people doing it. I don't want you to worry", I put my hand on his belly, "which is a silly comment, because I know you will worry. But just be sensible."

"Eat sensible when we get home."

"That's it and have fun, now."

"OK. And you'd say?"

"What?"

"If you think I'm getting too fat. I don't want…"

I leaned over and kissed him; that was new, holiday had relaxed both of us and Colin was more comfortable with PDAs than he had been. "I love you as you are, you know that. I just don't want to turn into a balloon."

"Getting bigger and bigger till…"

I made a childish popping sound and we both laughed.

Today it was a pizza place for lunch. Something leisurely, following the way everything shut down during the middle of the day. In the afternoon, there'd be a visit to some of the historic buildings. Yesterday had been the Puccini Museum, which you know, was surprisingly engaging, and we'd even managed to go to a concert in the Duomo, a string orchestra playing Vivaldi. Neither of us really had an idea whether the performance was any good or not, but we'd both enjoyed it.

"You sure there aren’t things you'd rather do?"

"We are doing them, don't you worry."

"I just don't want to only do stuff that I like."

"For a start, I get to wake up next to you each day."

The hotel had been one of those last-minute website things. It was a typical tourist place, but we had a decent sized room, it was clean and tidy, and the beds pushed together. The young Greek guy on the reception desk had been entirely uninterested in our sleeping habits, he had been more concerned to get our passport and credit-card details. I had been relieved; I had blithely told Colin it would be OK, but sod's law said we'd get a homophobic hotelier.

It was warm, of course, neither of us bothered with night clothes and by a miracle Colin happily wandered to the bathroom like that. I counted it a minor victory, though I didn't say anything. The first day, we'd come across a menswear shop, and he'd ended up buying some snazzy shorts. We'd had a laugh about them because they were real holiday wear and we both kept coming up with unlikely places at home that he could wear them.

"My ideal holiday is a lazy one, though I don't really do beaches."

"But I thought you mentioned nude beaches?"

I waggled my eyebrows, "That doesn't have a lot to do with sunbathing, there's other fun to be had."

"Of course. Are there naked beaches here?"

"I think there's one on the coast, but I figured the sun might be too much."

He grinned, "Grilled genitals."

"Barbequed bits! Something like that. So, to go back to the question, this is my type of holiday. A bit of sight-seeing, a lot of sitting around and some pottering about."

"OK. Good."

"Are you having fun?"

He went bright pink, "I like sleeping next to you and being able to make love all the time."

I grinned, "Sexy beast", and gave his upper thigh a squeeze under the table. We had, in fact, done it rather a lot. Generally gentle and tender, it had been one of the surprises of the holiday.

He continued, "And I like the way you find things out".

I had arrived with a whole list of things off the internet. His face had lit up when he realised quite how much 'old stuff' there was here, and he had declared the buildings awesome, and from the first moment of sight-seeing we were away looking at details. He'd even started talking to people. If I wasn't around, he'd use a few words of Italian but wouldn't do it in front of me, I was the one that had to make a fool of myself trying to speak the language.

---

It wasn't all sweetness and light, of course. We could both get touchy, and I still had to remind myself that there were two of us on the holiday. I tended to march ahead on my own, if I wasn't careful, like on the first night when I organised dinner without asking Colin and he'd had other ideas. In fact, it turned out OK because my choice of restaurant was actually rather enjoyable, and we went to Colin's the following night.

Colin on the other hand, worried a bit too much. He was always on the look-out for me getting over-tired and I had to avoid my tendency to bat away his solicitousness. And it was difficult to get him to come out and say directly what he fancied, what he wanted. I was learning, we both were and whilst there were times when we were being too careful around each other, there were times when we wandered along, looking at something or looking for something and were simply enjoying each other's company.

I also had things to work out of my own.

As and when the money came through, what was my attitude to it? The problem was, there wasn't anything I particularly wanted. So, in the quiet moments sitting under the trees of the piazza, I tried to enumerate things.

· Pay off the house - a definite.

· Get a new car - did I really want a flash car? Probably not, but something a bit newer might be sensible.

· A new house - was there anything that a new one might have that I lacked? I didn't think so.

· Art and furniture - hmm. Truth to tell, I was happy with what I had.

· Holidays - definitely, but how to bring Colin along.

· Colin

This latter was the biggest problem. If I had more money, would he let me treat him to holidays? Would he let me, say, invest in his business? We needed to have a conversation.

"I've been having a good old think and wanted to chat to you, see what you thought."

"About what?", Colin looked worried.

"No need to look like that, it's just my tendency to nag away at stray loose ends."

We were sitting in a café in a square near the Piazza dell'Anfiteatro, where we'd found a lovely little place that sold the most delicious ice cream and had tables in the shade. For our last full day in Lucca, we were treating ourselves to a self-indulgent mixture of flavours. Colin's dish seemed to have three of the most luridly coloured and alarmingly contrasting ones, though he assured me, with a blissful smile, that they tasted lovely.

"It's about money. We've been assured that the income from my grandfather's estate will be reaching our accounts in a month or so."

"Which means?"

"In real terms, I will have double the income I have at the moment, possibly more."

“Real terms?”

“Well, the extra money is all unencumbered, so is available to spend. The existing money goes on necessary things, mortgage, household bills, that sort of thing. grandfather’s money will be entirely for spending on unnecessary things.”

"What are you going to do with it?"

"Precisely. I think I will go with the giving to charity idea, and we can look into charities we feel could be deserving."

"Gay ones and such?"

"And the arts, locally."

"OK."

"And I will look into paying off the house. It cost a lot less than my London place, and I had an unfairly small mortgage to begin with because I'd had a couple of big bonuses at work."

"Makes sense."

"I might get a new car, but nothing flash. Thing is, there isn't lots I really want. I'm happy."

"And relaxed?"

I nodded, "That too. But there are other things I could spend income on."

"Such as", Colin looked at me puzzled, trying to work out where this was going.

I took a deep breath, "I'm probably going to say this all wrong, so don't bite my head off."

"OK."

"I was hoping that at some point, the two of us could talk about living together. Rent out your place and you move into mine. I was sort of hoping you wanted that too", I hurried on before he could answer, "But the money becomes an issue. I don't know how much you take out of your business, but I'd imagine that with the extra, I'd have a lot more than you. And then there's holidays, if I wanted to go somewhere nice, then I'd want to go with you and", I shrugged, "that would mean me paying for you. Then there's your business. Would you let me invest in it?"

Colin stared at me, and then wiped his eyes and I realised he was upset. "I'm sorry, it's just me being stupid. I never thought. Never dreamed", he gave me a beaming smile, "I'd love to move in with you at some point. This year?"

I grinned at him, "I think we can manage that."

"And we'll have to think about the money. I reckon it should be possible. Maybe have a joint account that we both put the same in and then use yours for extras. Same with holidays. You said about us always making sure we talk, well if we do that then we're OK, aren't we? Would be silly to argue, because we had too much money."

"Good. I don't think I'm very good with money."

"You've done OK, so far."

"Partly because I had a few stupid bonuses to fall back on and a generous salary. I was lucky. Once beyond Uni and my first years in a job, I was never in a position to have to count pennies. I worry that things will get beyond me."

"So, we both do it, together. And my business, I'd like that. I'd need to think, mind. I've never had to be answerable to anyone."

"Except the bank!"

"Yeah, there is that. But, you know, if we needed something and we had money then that was it, if the money wasn’t there then we couldn’t spend. If I had a bit more cash, then what would I do?"

"Do you have a business plan?"

"Yeah, well, I have stuff I put together for the bank and such."

"So, if you updated that and put some new figures together, that would be a start. Get your accountant to produce some management accounts."

He gave me a smirk, "OK. Good idea. I'm sorry about earlier."

"Don't be daft."

"It's just. Well, I never dreamed I'd meet someone proper, certainly not at home. And never thought I'd be able to live with someone. It just wasn't done."

"At home?"

"Yeah. Makes it seem like a backwater, but that’s what it was, I suppose. And then, when I came down here, I went to Manchester a few times and had some nasty experiences."

"Problems because you were gay?"

"Nah, because of my size and that I didn't fit in. I expect there are places like Ten Tons of Fun there, but I sort of took fright. Sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry about", and I took his hand under the table. "Now, what are we doing for dinner?"

Colin licked his lips, wiped the ice cream off his face and smiled, "I haven't finished my ice cream yet."

"But it always helps if we plan in advance." He rolled his eyes. "How about that steak?"

Colin had been eyeing the steak for the whole of our visit. It was a special local cut, something typical of Florence I gathered, and was rather large. Steak wasn't high on my wants list, but I was happy to give it a go.