Andante

CXCII

"Come on in!"
Eddy had still been feeling a little bit guilty about dragging Brett away from his new friends on their way over here, but all that was forgotten now that he was looking at Mr. Davids' kind face as he opened his door wide and gestured for them to come into the spacious hallway.
"Hi guys! I'm so glad you made it!" he said as the boys kicked off their shoes on the mat. "I hope you like risotto. I would have done Chinese, because I do like cooking it, but I figured your palates would be too discerning for my earnest attempt at hotpot."
Brett grinned beside him.
"I'm sure it would have been great, Mr. Davids." Eddy said politely. To be honest, Mr. Davids, cooking hotpot? He got the feeling they were probably safer with the risotto.
"Excuse me, what did I tell you while back? Please call me John." Mr. Davids waggled his eyebrows.
There was something about Mr. Davids, erm... John, a kindness, but also a gregariousness, that meant you just couldn't help but like him. His house was exactly the way Eddy had pictured it, as well. It was all white with wooden floors, and there were large modern paintings in vivid colours hanging everywhere. They followed Mr. Davids into a big open kitchen with marble work tops and a giant wooden table. There was a fair haired man in a pastel coloured shirt sitting at the far end of the table near the open French doors, reading a newspaper. He looked up and smiled at them both.
"This is Mark, my partner." John introduced him as he turned his attention back to the pan that was steaming on the stove.
"Nice to meet you!" Mark said, getting up and sticking out his hand, but it took Eddy just a second too long, just a moment too long of having his mouth open, of trying not to sink through the ground in shock.
"H-hi." he said then, taking Mark's outstretched hand and smiling at him, but John was already grinning from the kitchen.
"That a bit of a surprise for you?" he said pleasantly. "Don't worry, guys, I have a pretty effective gay-dar. Please feel free to just be yourselves, here."
What the actual fuck? 
The words were so loud in his brain that he almost said them out loud. John started laughing over his risotto pot and turned to him, his kind eyes boring into him.
"Or are you going to tell me I'm wrong?"
Eddy felt like his tongue had a sudden case of paralysis, but then Brett cleared his throat from beside him.
"Erm, no, Mr., er, John. You're not wrong, but erm, we're... we're not out."
John nodded and turned the fire off. He picked up two red and white checkered oven gloves and put them on his hands.
"I know, Brett, I get that. But for tonight... you can be. Cool?"

It was weird, because even though Eddy could feel full well how worrying it was that John had made them, just seemingly so easily, at the same time it was like a huge weight was being lifted off his shoulders. Like Atlas was allowed to just set down the world, just for an evening, and rest.
With a small shake of the head he walked over to John in the kitchen and spoke softly.
"Yeah, cool. Erm, can I help you with anything? Set the table or something?"

A couple of minutes later John carried the cast iron pan full of risotto to the table and set it down gingerly on the heat mat Eddy had just put down there. He had taken the chair closest to the French doors with Brett by his right side, across from Mark. Eddy eyed the fork that was lying next to his plate with more than a bit of suspicion, while John picked up an ornate serving spoon and started spooning his lovely smelling risotto on all the plates.
A fork, huh? He really wasn't too sure if he knew how to use that well enough for polite company, but he guessed asking for chopsticks to eat his Italian food would be a bit of a weird thing to do?John put the serving spoon back down, took his seat next to Mark and smiled across the table.
"So, guys, tell me everything. How is violining going? And how have you been?"