Right Back After This

Episode 32

"So." Amello works through each word slowly. "You're telling me that you had- sex with Ares, and so now he thinks you're in love with him, and he's going to try and kidnap you because of it?"

Riz wouldn't choose those words, but the facts aren't entirely wrong. "I guess you could describe it that way?"

Amello raises his hands as if about to speak, but he's unable to get the words out. He starts speaking, stops, lowers his hands, sighs. "I see why you needed nobody to hear this."

"Look, I'm- I'm mainly telling you this because I could use your help," Riz begins, and it snaps Amello out of whatever he's thinking.

"Of course I'll help. Of course, of course, whatever you need." Amello takes Riz's hand again, just as easily. "I'm just trying to understand, but it's not- I will help you whether I understand or not."

"What don't you understand?"

Riz expects a few things. Amello is, ultimately, from Bryten. He doesn't have the same kind of accent that Paloma does, that reeking of privilege, since he wasn't rich by the standards of the planet- but he grew up in the shadow of Arbo, always reaching up to it. Riz has no clue what they teach kids on Bryten. Like Deliquet, is sex as a whole a sin, or is it just taught that it should be in marriage, or between men and women? Maybe they don't teach kids about it at all. Maybe Amello was always being shaped for a life so particularly censored that it was something they didn't want him to understand. Maybe, for one reason or another, external or internal, sex isn't a thing Amello was ever interested in.

"Why," Amello asks after a slow moment, "...did you have- sex with him if you don't love him?"

Riz can't help himself. He knows it's rude to laugh, but he can't stop the sudden giggle that comes forth when Amello says that. "Sorry," he apologises immediately. "You're actually as innocent as they say you are, aren't you?"

"Who? The fans?" Amello asks, and Riz shakes his head. He supposes the fans do say that. They're all meant to be innocent.

"I don't know. I just- that is what you don't get?"

"Yes." Amello pouts. "I was always told it was something you did with people you love."

Riz shouldn't be given pause by that. But he is. "...is it something you've done?"

"No." At least Amello was never told that that answer is a bad thing. "Because I've never been in love. Romantically, you know?"

Riz didn't expect to be having this exact conversation right now. "Well. I've never been in love and I've..." it's still weird to say it to Amello so openly. "...done it a bit."

"Oh." The two of them stare at each other. "I thought it was- I thought it was an expression of love."

"It can be," Riz mutters, "...or you can do it because it feels good and the person is hot. Often all of the above."

"Really? You just- you have sex with just, anyone you think is hot?"

Riz is starting to not regret this conversation as much as he did previously, despite the danger looming over him. Danger's always looming, so it seems. He's been using this new power of his for one specific evil- or perhaps one specific good, although he certainly feels devious in this moment. Amello might actually have been as innocent as the managers wanted to paint him. That might be about to be past tense.

"You certainly can," Riz says with a raised eyebrow, "...and I generally do. As long as nobody finds out."

"Right. Because-" Amello suddenly looks away- "you've been lying on camera."