My Own Way

Mello ran down the stairway, as if speed and exertion alone could wash the emotion from his soul. His body was tingling, his mind was screaming. It was bigger and greater than anything that he could contain. He had kissed Mail Jeevas. Willingly and of his own violition, he had kissed the one person who could infiltrate his celebracy. He paused on a landing and paced back and forth. He could go back now. He could end this. Send him home. Kill him. Kiss him again. He could still feel the taste of him! It was there. It was insidious. It was everywhere.



"I ne uvedi nas u napast. I ne uvedi nas u napast. I ne uvedi nas u napast." Mello muttered aloud, clutching his rosary in both hands. "I ne uvedi nas u napast." He exhaled, staring out at the city above the concrete balcony wall. Lead us not into temptation. "I ne uvedi nas u napast." The world grew a little quieter. He had to keep it together. There were more battles to fight out in this city tonight. Mello blew and counted, letting his shoulders sag. He was not out of his depth. This was perfectly alright. He pushed his gun back into the waistband of his trousers and a hand fluttered to his hair. It was a mess. He had to be gorgeous. Blow their minds. He took out his hairbrush and mirror. His face was covered in blood. He had hit Matt. He had smashed up the face that looked at him like that. He had said some cruel things, untrue things. Anything to stop Matt looking at him like they had a history or a future. "I ne uvedi nas u napast." It was all well and good beseeching the Lord like this, but Mello knew that it had been in his mind for years. To think it was a sin, to act upon the thought was worse. There was no absolution finally from himself. He was teetering on the point of no return and it was going to end in the fires of Hell.



Mello glanced at his watch. Batinelli. He ran the rest of the way down the stairwell, pushing hairbrush and mirror into his pocket as he went. He ran several streets to where the car was waiting. Wide-eyed soldiers sat inside, but he had appeared from nowhere. He still had blood on his face. "It\'s not mine." He smirked. "Drive." Anderson handed him some tissues, while Monroe drove. Mello\'s expression was so weird that neither one of them asked him where the blood had come from. It had been around his mouth! That placed some strange images into their heads. What had he bit off? And off of whom?

I ne uvedi nas u napast.

They arrived at Batinelli\'s compound and Monroe opened the door for Mello. The teenager stood, radiating power, smiling serenely to himself. Batinelli\'s Consigliere came out personally to greet him, shaking hands on the tarmac. Mello took the hand graciously, though he was glad that it was this young man and not the previous Don\'s advisor. This man was already out of his depth. The party was conveyed inside, where Batinelli himself stood waiting. His fear was apparent in his eyes. "Ross sends his regards and hopes that we may reach an amicable solution." Mello sat at precisely the same moment as he was asked to. "I will be blunt. We are already taking this to the mattress. Why don\'t you give us the south side?"



Batinelli lost his temper immediately. "Ross has it completely wrong! None of our men pulled that stunt on your car!"



His Consigliere interupted, "Mello, the Don wishes to give his word to Ross that, on his honour, this was nothing to do with our family. It is not worth an all out war to settle a difference that doesn\'t exist."



Mello glanced in disbelief from one to the other. The Batinellis already had no future, if these were the two men at their head. Nontheless he settled down and began to negotiate.



Across the city, Matt stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. He had a nasty cut on his cheekbone, but nothing that a couple of stitches couldn\'t rectify. He vaguely remembered that you couldn\'t just walk into a hospital in America, as they didn\'t have a National Health Service. Even getting a plaster on a graze had to be paid for or something like that. He wondered how it worked. He had about 900 dollars, would that be enough for a couple of stitches? He held a wad of tissue over the cut and searched the internet for answers. None of it made a lot of sense though. He had already soaked through the tissues before he realised that \'urgent care\' was the Americanism for \'casualty\', but there were no price lists. Then he read about people dying in ER waiting rooms, because hospital staff ignored them. It appeared to be a one-off incident, but it was enough to make Matt close the browser. Healthcare in America was just too confusing to even contemplate attempting to access it. Besides, he had remembered that he had enough amphetamines in his system to end up in prison. They had Death Row in America. It was all a bit pioneer-mentality-ish for a drugged up practically-English lad.



Matt returned to the bathroom and inspected the cut again. On second thoughts, it probably didn\'t need stitches, even if it was still bleeding badly. He changed the tissue and held it tightly over the wound, moving his cigarette to the other side of his mouth. Or he could do the stitches himself. The thought of taking a needle and pushing it into his own flesh made him feel nauseaous. Sod it, he would go out and stock up on First Aid supplies, then try to stick it together or something. He didn\'t actually move though, he just sat there, staring at himself in the mirror. Mello had kissed him.



He thought he had got this out of his system over by the fridge-freezer, but sitting here with his face all puffy up around a bruise and a laceration, it was back. In some ways, it didn\'t surprise him. Mello had always had too many feelings to bury beneath that ice king exterior. There had been too much Christianity getting in the way, but if that hadn\'t been there, then Matt had no doubt that Mello\'s sexuality would have erupted years ago. Maybe it already had. Maybe that\'s what Mello had been trying to tell him, that he dressed like that because he had fucked half the population of the City of Angels. So why all of that talk about the \'most dangerous man alive\' and the crossing of himself before he did it? Matt threw away, as arrogance, the conclusion that he, himself, was the dangerous man, not some Mafia Godfather somewhere, but the person whom the Catholic boy was about to kiss. Blood dripped down onto his mouth and so he changed the tissue again.



Mello had said to wait for him. Was he coming back? Tonight? Was this going to lead all the way? Suddenly Matt wasn\'t ready for that. His insides cringed at the thought of someone getting that close to him. In the past there had been the occasional hug, usually in celebration, but it had been as brothers. Matt had never let anyone but Mello hug him and that was only because their history had spanned so many years. It was all about personal space. Sometimes, after Matt had dropped a pill and was all loved up, he would allow a quick hug from Aimee, Gallagher or one of the other women, but pushed them away before it became a cuddle. He just reached a point where it was uncomfortable; their proximity confused him. It wasn\'t about sexuality. Though Matt\'s homosexuality was largely theoretical, he was certain that it was true. Women just left him cold, but Mello... Matt felt the flush travel from his groin to his face.



That blond had hit him and Matt still felt like this. Worse still, the thought of being on his back, punched and pinned down, with Mello straddling him, bearing down in all that leather, or the memory of being pressed up against the fridge-freezer, fearing for his life, with his wrists captured above his head... Matt bowed his head, unable to stand his reflection a moment longer. It told him shameful things about himself, but he was already hard. It would have to be dealt with before he could go out. It was clouding his thoughts. But then, his thoughts were telling him that he was just like one of those battered spouses, who forgave every beating for tenuous reasons. Was \'it makes me horny as Hell\' any better than \'I deserved it\'? Matt slipped down onto the floor, blood splashing onto white tiles and fear gripping his stomach; holding his face together with tissues, while his other hand undid the buttons at his flies and slid inside. It was of Mello that he thought, kneeling over him and pointing a gun. Hitting him with a gun. Glaring at him in hatred. Kissing him.



Mello left the Batinelli house having gained far more than he had actually set out to do. The Don was just too transparent and brainless, without a strong Consigliere to make good his deficiencies. Mello smiled as soon as the car was safely out of the gates and heard Anderson chuckle in the front seat. Even the soldiers here were more intelligent than the boss in there. "Rod ought to be pleased with this night\'s work." Mello laughed.



"You ran rings around them, Mello."



"I know." He snapped off chocolate and grinned out of the window. "Idiots." He pulled out his \'phone and called Rod, reporting back the good news. The three men all heard the roar of elation through the \'phone line. Mello grinned, but his gaze had found a point on the skyline, where an apartment building blocked out the stars. \'I ne uvedi nas u napast...\' He thought to himself, but was so drunk on his successes, he wondered if he could get away with it. If he told Rod there was a woman out there... but where had he met her? No, he would lead them straight to Matt. "We\'re on our way back, boss. Ten minutes to the aircraft."



"Good, because I wanted to talk to you about your progress on that missile."



"Oh, that\'s all sorted out. It\'s practically on its way."



"I honestly don\'t know what we would do without you, Mello." Rod laughed heartily.



Mello smiled, said his goodbyes and closed the line. He looked out upon streets that he practically owned now and over at one he wished he could direct the car towards. If this was the City of Angels, then tonight he felt like its Archangel. Sovereignty dripped through his veins like a drug. Then Monroe spoke up. "Mello, where did you go before the meeting?"



The blond raised his gun, pointing it straight at Monroe\'s head as he drove. He leaned forward, so that the look in his eyes could be properly seen in the rearview mirror. The soldier was already sweating. Mello words came out mockingly, "Oh, didn\'t Rod take you into his confidence? Did the soldier expect to be told everything?" His gaze narrowed. "Learn to keep quiet, Monroe. How would we break a soldier? Oh yes, a button."



Anderson intervened, "Come on, Mello. He was just asking."



"Yes, and he\'ll learn never to breathe a word about it again." The gun lingered for a full minute more, before it was withdrew and Mello sat back eating chocolate as if nothing had happened. The rest of the journey passed in silence.



Matt wandered around the supermarket, goggling at the sheer array of choice in these places. The store could have fitted about twelve British supermarkets into it and at least one in this section alone. He was feeling a little light-headed and nauseaous, through lack of sleep and loss of blood probably. Working out which brand corresponded with British brands was just too tedious to contemplate. He took one of everything, dropping them into the basket, after a quick skimming of the prices told him that everything in America was cheap. Bandages, anti-septics, hurrah! a butterfly medical stitch kit, more arnica, painkillers, plasters (which turned out to be called Band Aid, though apparently not after the collective charity group), safety pins... he stopped looking and just threw things into his basket until it was full. If Mello was going to keep on visiting with violence in mind, then he was going to need it.



His cheek was still dripping blood, nearly an hour later. Matt had a pocket full of tissues to keep replacing that held against the injury. People kept spotting him and giving him a wide berth, as if his bleeding was somehow dangerous. He supposed it might be, what with AIDS and hepatitis and all, but he was trying not to let any land on the floor. He also picked up a bottle of whiskey and added it to the medical supplies, then took himself to the cash tills. The young, Hispanic woman behind the till looked at him with mingled disgust and concern. "Can I see your ID please, Sir?"



"ID?" Matt looked confused. "Erm, I\'m a tourist."



"Oh, where are you from?"



"Great Britain." He flashed a smile.



"Really? Where is that?"



He stared at her incredulously, but a man in the queue behind called out. "He means the United Kingdom."



"Oh! The UK! I would love to go there!" She gushed, as she scanned packets of burn anti-septic seals that he couldn\'t remember having put in his basket. "I had a friend go there and she said it is so tiny."



Matt forced a laugh. "Yeah. I suppose it is."



She lingered eventually on the whiskey. "If you have no ID, may I see your passport, Sir?"



"Erm," Matt could feel the earth opening up and wanting to suck him down into it. "I\'ve come out without it. I am over eighteen though."



"The legal requirement for the purchase of liquor is a minimum age of twenty-one. I\'m sorry, Sir, but I am required to see some ID before I can serve you with this liquor."



"The liquor being the whiskey?" Matt felt like he was trying to converse in a foreign language.



"Yes, Sir."



"Ok, forget the whiskey." He could feel the tissue becoming sodden again under his hand. "Would you like me to put it back on the shelf for you?"



"That would not be necessary, Sir. I do love your quaint accent." She rang through the purchases and smiled at him. "That will be forty-three dollars and 82 cents please, Sir."



Matt gasped, "How much?"



She shrugged, "You did buy rather a lot of medical supplies, Sir."



"No, it\'s a lot cheaper than I..." He struggled one handed with the wad of notes, eventually just thrusting some likely ones at her. She handed half of them back to him, but he was just grateful that he hadn\'t given her an inadequate supply of single dollars. Matt hurried out into the city, desperate to just get out of there before anyone else attempted to discuss anything with him. He reached his car and climbed into it, patching himself up as best he could in the minimal light and the rearview mirror. A knocking on the window nearly scared the life out of him. It was the man from the queue behind him. Matt rolled down the window. "Did I do something else wrong?"



The man laughed. "No, but I know what\'s it\'s like being in a strange country without a guide. When I was in the UK, the kindness of strangers got me to my plane on time." He raised his hand with the bottle of whiskey in it. "You looked like you could do with a drink."



Matt blinked. "Wow! Thank you! Erm." He reached into his pocket. "How much do I owe you?"



"Call it a gift. You look like you haven\'t been having fun in my country so far." He pushed the bottle into Matt\'s hand. "Welcome to the U S of A. Have a nice day." Then he just walked away.



Matt watched him go in utter shock, trying to imagine a Briton doing that. Ok, so whiskey was about ten times the price in Britain, but even so. He smiled and tucked it into his bag, then waved as the man drove by in a huge Station Wagon. "Nice man." He muttered and felt a lot better as he drove himself back to the apartment.