Will Wonders Ever Cease (Call Me By Your Name)
I said the series was complete...but now I guess it's even more complete? (Inspiration struck for a coda!)
WILL WONDERS EVER CEASE
Fandom: Call Me By Your Name
Summary: Elio moves to New York. (Glimpses of their new life together, set across the course of one year.)
Characters: Oliver, Elio, OC
Words: 3,700
Notes:
A New York coda to the series “He Thinks of Elio.” Thank you to Tessiebear81, whose comment got me thinking about this! It will probably make the most sense if you’ve read the rest of the series (or at least part 3, “Wasted My Life Playing Dumb”). But you could also get by if you just know the following:
When Oliver returned to New York after his summer with the Perlmans, trying to figure out what to do now that Elio had upended his life, he made friends with his elderly (and awesome) neighbor Esther. Her wisdom and perspective gave him just enough of a nudge towards making a different decision than in canon: daring to try to make things work with Elio despite his fears, and visiting him that winter for Hanukkah. Now a month or so has passed since that wintertime visit in Italy, and it’s the beginning of 1984.
Just to keep with the theme of the series, the title is of course from Sufjan Stevens, from “Mystery of Love.”
(This is a set of vignettes over the course of a year, each taking place on a different Jewish holiday - though as you’ll see, some relate more directly to the holiday in question than others.)
Previously in this series:
Sweetly, Before the Mystery Ends
Be My Rest, Be My Fantasy
Wasted My Life Playing Dumb
Sea Lion Caves in the Dark
Read this fic on AO3, or here below:
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Tu B’Shevat (the New Year of the Trees), January 19, 1984
“I swear I saw a tree today that was starting to bud. Just the tiniest green beginnings of leaves.”
Elio’s laugh through the phone line is the most welcome sound. “Did you call me just to tell me about a tree?”
Oliver wraps the phone cord around one finger, spiraling and un-spiraling it. He tries to let the sound of his smile come through in his voice. “It made it seem as if spring were almost here, even though it’s still January. It feels like an age since Hanukkah.”
“And a million years until April.”
“It’s three months until April,” Oliver corrects, laughing.
“More or less the same thing,” Elio counters, and Oliver can’t argue with that.
It’s afternoon here, with winter sun streaming in through the window of Oliver’s apartment, which means it’s evening in Italy. Oliver is in his favorite perch: tipped back in an old hard-backed wooden chair, one foot up on the windowsill, looking out over his city. And Elio at the other end of the phone line.
“You know, Esther keeps asking me when you’re coming. Did I tell you she always refers to you as my ‘young Italian man’?” Oliver rocks further back in his chair, letting the phone cord swing beside him, and does a passable impression. “‘When is your young Italian man coming?’ ‘Wasn’t your young Italian man supposed to visit?’ ‘When do I get to meet your young Italian man?’”
Elio’s reply is a full-throated laugh. “I don’t know how I feel about being reduced to mere attributes. I’m more than my nationality and age.”
Oliver leans into the receiver, as if that could bring Elio closer. “Well, it’s better than what she calls me. I’ve heard her on the phone a couple of times, talking to friends, and it’s always ‘the nice young man’. ‘Oh, Oliver’s visiting me right now, you know, the nice young man from across the street.’”
On the other end of the phone line, Elio sounds like he’s about to collapse from mirth. “If only she knew what you’re really like.”
“If only she knew,” Oliver agrees, smirking. “If only she knew what I’m thinking right now. If only she knew everything I plan to do to you when you visit in April.”
Elio’s breath hitches. “You’re going to kill me.”
“I certainly hope not. But I plan to do everything else one person can do to another. Everything we haven’t even thought of yet.”
“Don’t stop.”
“Never.”
Into the ragged breaths of their silence, Elio whispers, “I miss you.”
Space gapes open inside Oliver’s chest when Elio talks like that. Italy is so far away.
“I miss you too. Never doubt it.” Oliver says it quietly, even though there’s no one around to overhear. But those words are only ever for Elio.
*
Pesach (Passover), April 16, 1984
“So this is your young Italian man. Even more handsome than his photograph.” Esther reaches up to pull Elio’s head down towards her, so she can plant a kiss on each of his cheeks. Elio blushes, extravagantly and charmingly.
Feeling bold, Oliver steps closer and rests one hand against Elio’s back. “We only have him for a few days, while he’s look at colleges. But I’m glad the timing worked out with Passover. Thanks for inviting us, Bubbe Esther.”
He hands Esther the bottle of wine he brought, the sickly sweet Manischewitz stuff that somehow Passover isn’t complete without.
“Thank you, bubeleh.” Esther gives Elio’s cheek one last pat, then accepts the wine from Oliver and takes it to the table, already laid for the seder and the meal. Her movements, as always, are small and precise within the neatly arranged space of her home.
Although Oliver knows Esther mainly as a solitary being, they’re not the only strays she’s collected for her seder tonight. There’s Judy, the daughter of some distant cousin; she’s currently studying in New York and thus has found herself drawn under Esther’s wing. And Rafael, who used to do odd jobs for Esther, but now, she says, is like family.
They gather at the table and Esther hands a Haggadah to each of them. It’s a tight squeeze, here at Esther’s little table in her tiny apartment. Oliver’s leg presses against Elio’s under the table, and Elio grins.
They fall into an easy rhythm, each taking turns reading from the Haggadah, and all joining in on the blessings: over the candles, the wine, the ritual foods. When they reach the four questions, usually asked by the youngest child in a family, Esther reaches over to tap Elio’s shoulder.
He ducks his head, looking embarrassed at being so clearly singled out, an eighteen-year-old among more unequivocal adults. But he chants the questions in clear, confident Hebrew: Mah nishtanah halailah hazeh mikol haleilot…
Like everything about Elio’s impossible, effortless brilliance, it’s an utter turn-on.
When it’s time for the meal, it’s clear Esther has produced a feast. Everything has been made from scratch in her tiny kitchen: kugel and borscht and gefilte fish and tzimmes and of course matzah ball soup. She urges them to take seconds and then thirds, and Oliver can see her thinking very loudly that Elio is too thin. She nudges dish after dish toward him and beams when he accepts.
Judy, it turns out, is a classical music buff, and over the meal she and Elio wander onto conversational tangents no one else can follow. Rafe is quieter, a little shy, but by the end of the night he and Elio are debating obscure French poets.
Oliver’s glance happens to catch on Esther, as the others are listening raptly to Elio relating a story from one of his archeological outings with his dad. Esther reaches over to pat Oliver’s hand. Under the cover of the others’ conversation, she leans in and says close to his ear, in that very sure way she has, “Yes. He’s right for you.”
Much later, in Oliver’s bed, he and Elio are drifting back into quiet, drunk on Passover wine and each other’s nearness. The bedroom window is wide open despite the spring chill and Elio is pressed close, his face mashed warm into Oliver’s chest, clearly sliding toward sleep.
“Did you like Esther?” Oliver asks, carding his hand through Elio’s damp curls. The newness of this, of Elio in his bed, in his city. His heart might burst with it.
“Mm-hm,” Elio mumbles into Oliver’s skin. “Someone who wants to feed me that much, what’s not to like?”
Oliver laughs, and feels Elio’s answering laugh rumble against his chest.
Then Elio shifts, peering up at Oliver in the almost-dark. He sounds fully awake again when he says, “Besides, she loves you. That’s what matters.”
*
Havdalah (the end of Shabbat, and the start of each new week), Saturday, September 1, 1984
“And no one knows where the night is going…” Leonard Cohen rasps from Oliver’s scratchy old turntable, over a plaintive violin. Oliver runs his hand over the curve of Elio’s shoulder, and Elio arches into his touch.
It’s a Saturday night in New York and they could be anywhere right now, out there in the life of the city. But for tonight they’re simply here, tangled in Oliver’s bed as they have been for hours, alternately passionate and languorous. It’s a holy small window of time: Elio has moved into his dorm, but not yet started classes, and they have these few brief days for nothing but each other.
Time feels fleeting, even now that Elio is here to stay.
“And those who dance, begin to dance
Those who weep, begin…”
Oliver leans in and kisses his way from Elio’s shoulder to his collarbone. “I love this spot,” he mumbles into that delicate wing of bone.
“I know you do.” Elio shivers as Oliver’s lips brush his skin.
“Am I that predictable?”
“Not predictable. But…very intent.”
Oliver slides down until his head rests on Elio’s chest, his ear nestled against the steady beat of Elio’s heart, which taps a rhythm lightly offset from the music.
“I was obsessed with Leonard Cohen as a kid,” Oliver muses, his eyes on the record player across the room. “When I was 13 or 14, I would hole up in my room and listen to him over and over. Even though I doubt I understood much of it, at that age. My very normal parents must have wondered how they’d created such a strange, intense child.”
“You?” Elio says, all his disbelief in that word.
“Yes, me,” Oliver chuckles. “You have this invulnerable image of me, but that’s the kind of kid I was. Awkwardly intense and reading poetry when I was supposed to be, I don’t know, going to school dances and football games. It’s a learned skill, you know, acting the way people expect you to act. It took a long time to learn to be as perfect as I am now.”
Elio pinches him in the side, laughing. “You’re so full of yourself!”
Oliver flips onto his stomach, so he can press his mouth to Elio’s ribs. “You’re not arguing with the perfection, though.”
“So full of yourself.” Elio reaches down to rub Oliver’s hair, ruffling it so it stands on end. “Wish I could have known you then, though.”
“Oh god, don’t even say that. When I was 13, you were -”
“Ugh, shut up, shut up!” Elio claps his hand over Oliver’s mouth.
Oliver retaliates by biting it, getting his teeth satisfyingly latched into the softest part of Elio’s palm. They struggle back and forth for a bit, and somehow end up with Oliver on his back and Elio sprawled across his chest, trying to bite his shoulder. Oliver fends him off with one hand as Elio flails at him, as uncoordinated as he is eager.
“You wild animal,” Oliver says, and he hears in his own voice how helplessly fond he sounds.
“You started it,” Elio retorts.
Oliver kisses him deeply, with the pretense of shutting him up.
“Are you excited to start classes?” Oliver asks, when his mouth is free to speak again.
“Yeah.” Even without looking, he can hear the smile that curls into Elio’s voice.
“It’s the start of a whole new chapter for you,” Oliver says, keeping his voice light. He presses his hand into Elio’s back, drawing him down, drawing him closer.
“You worried?” Elio lets himself be drawn in, sliding both his hands under Oliver’s back.
“No.” Maybe.
“There will always be a place for you, Oliver,” Elio whispers, his mouth close to Oliver’s throat, his breath damp and hot. “There’s always a place for you, no matter what else.”
Oliver shivers as those words whisper over his skin. He takes Elio’s face in both his hands and pulls him near, until their mouths collide and their bodies melt into a single rhythm of desire.
Into the darkness, Leonard sings, “Oh, love, I need you, I need you, I need you, I need you, oh, I need you now…”
*
Sukkot (harvest festival), October 10, 1984
“This is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever done,” Elio declares. He’s leaning a little too far out the window of Oliver’s apartment, stretching to attach decorative gourds to the frame Oliver has rigged up outside the window, made of scrap wood and twigs.
“See, the problem with saying that is, I know you. So I know it’s not true.” Oliver has Elio firmly by the belt loops, even though it’s probably unnecessary. But just in case.
Elio pulls himself back inside, red-cheeked and grinning. “All I’m saying is, I’ve never made a sukkah outside a window before.”
“Well, be fair, I haven’t either.”
The truth is, it never felt like there was much point in going to such lengths to celebrate holidays, when it was only for him alone.
Even now, what they’ve made is at most a sukkah in miniature, one that just barely passes the tests of “you can shelter under it (if you stick your head out the window far enough)” and “you can see the stars through the branches (if New York weren’t a world of light pollution).”
“It’s very nice.” Elio gives Oliver’s arm a conciliatory pat. “For a first attempt.”
“Hey!” As usual, Oliver’s mock indignation and Elio’s buoyant laughter lead them into a shoving match, with laughter and grappling and the sinuous slide of skin beneath hands. They end up both breathing hard, with Elio’s back against the wall by the window and Oliver framing his body with both arms.
Oliver leans in and kisses him, slowly. Deliberately. It is a simple, exquisite pleasure to kiss Elio like this, any time he likes. If Elio stays in New York a million years, Oliver could still never learn to take this for granted.
“Hey,” Elio murmurs, between presses of his lips to Oliver’s. “We should show off our very impressive sukkah to Esther. Why don’t you call her? She could look right out her window and see it from there.”
Oliver disentangles himself from Elio only enough to reach for the phone, in its perch on the little table next to the window. This is where Oliver used to sit to talk to Elio in Italy, watching as the seasons changed outside.
Oliver dials Esther’s number and flicks the spiral phone cord out of his way. Elio ducks in under Oliver’s arm so they’re standing side by side, framed in the window.
“Hello, Bubbe Esther?” Oliver says when she picks up. “It’s me, Oliver. Are you close enough to a window that you could look out across the street?”
Across the way, one of her windows slowly lifts and Esther’s small white-haired head pokes out.
“We made a sukkah,” Oliver tells her over the phone, feeling an odd mixture of absurdity and pride. “A rather nontraditional one, but still.”
“Oh, you clever boys,” Esther says. Even from across the way, he can see her smile. “Isn’t that lovely?”
“You should come over sometime,” Oliver suggests. “We can have a meal together here by the window. It’s almost like being in a real sukkah.”
Beside him, Elio leans closer to the phone and calls, “Yes, come over, Bubbe! And I don’t know what Oliver is talking about, because our sukkah is totally a real one.”
Oliver gives Elio a very skeptical double eyebrow raise and mouths, Oh, so now you think it’s good enough?
It earns him a smirk in response.
They make a plan with Esther for the next evening, and Oliver hangs up the phone. Outside, a few yellow leaves drift past the window, carried on an updraft. The air smells fresh and new, despite the traffic below.
It’s fall in New York. It’s Sukkot everywhere. And here in this apartment, Oliver and Elio lean against the window frame, side by side, looking out over their city.
*
Hanukkah (festival of lights), December 18, 1984
“Are you sure you want me to come with you this time?”
Elio looks up from where he’s leaning over his open suitcase, shoving shirts into it without regard for order or wrinkles. “What? Why wouldn’t I want you to come?”
Oliver rubs a hand through his hair, ducking his head as though that will make him fit better into this space. He always feels out of place here in Elio’s dorm room: too tall, too old, too much. This is a place for being eighteen, for trying out all the world’s possibilities and not knowing what will happen next from day to day. As a grown man with a career and an apartment and a host of professional responsibilities, Oliver has no business being here.
To Elio he says, “Your first trip home, you might want to see your parents on your own. That’d be fine.”
They both bought plane tickets, but Oliver’s could surely be changed if necessary. Pro and Mrs. P might want a chance to see their son without an interloper, no matter how much they like that interloper. And Elio -
Well, Elio might want somewhere that’s just for him, for once.
Elio straightens up from his half-packed suitcase, frowning. “I can see my parents even if you’re there. And besides, they want to see you. Do you know how often my mom asked me to make sure you were coming for Hanukkah?” The frown gets deeper, shading into confusion. “Wait, you don’t want to come?”
“Of course I want to come.” Oliver drops down onto Elio’s twin bed; its flimsy frame protests.
Elio plops down next to him, and butts his head against Oliver’s shoulder. “But…?”
They know each other too well by now to hide any subtext. Of course Elio can hear that there are words behind these words.
Oliver sighs, and reaches up to stroke Elio’s curls, where they flop against the collar of Oliver’s shirt. “I’ve moved into every part of your life. Doesn’t it ever bother you? Don’t you want a chance to just be a college student, and do the things college students do?”
“I do the things college students do.”
It’s true, Elio somehow knew by instinct how to be smart about this. He has a life with Oliver, but he has a life with his classmates, too. He goes to parties and concerts and meals with friends; he seems to be universally liked. The pensive Elio who used to hang back and observe the summer social scene in Italy is becoming an Elio at ease with everyone.
Maybe it’s only Oliver who’s still learning his way into this new life.
“I just think sometimes,” he says softly into Elio’s hair, “if you get tired of this, would you know how to say so? Would you tell me?”
“I won’t ever get tired of you. But yeah, if I did, you’d know.”
Elio’s arms come around Oliver’s chest, and his face presses into Oliver’s neck.
“Elio,” Elio whispers.
“Oliver,” Oliver murmurs. It gives him a thrill every time, his own name spoken for Elio.
Elio sighs, a warm exhale, and squeezes him tighter. “Are you going to stop being stupid now and let me pack, so we can go to Italy tomorrow?”
“Not until I’ve done this.” Oliver turns Elio’s face so he can kiss him, hard and deep. Even though they’re in a dorm room. Even though Elio’s roommate could walk in at any time. In this moment, it’s a necessary risk.
“I want you with me in Italy,” Elio says between kisses. “I always want you in Italy.”
“And in New York?”
“I definitely always want you in New York. Besides…”
“Besides…?” Oliver prompts.
“Besides, it’s Hanukkah. Just like it was Hanukkah last year, when you came back.”
Elio and Oliver, Oliver and Elio. They began in summer, yes, in sun-soaked afternoons and longing glances and humid nights. But it was in winter that Oliver threw his caution to the wind and his heart on the line, and made the choice to return to Elio.
“I’d like to light candles with your family again,” Oliver says. He knows Elio can hear the subtext: that Oliver too is remembering that winter visit, those delirious first days of realizing there might be a future for them after all.
“And make latkes.”
“Oh, yes. We are definitely making latkes.”
“And you’ll let Vimini beat you at chess?”
“We both know it’s not like I have a choice.”
Elio laughs. Then he leans close and whispers, “Come home with me, Oliver.”
Home. It is, isn’t it? A kind of home for both of them.
*
Tu B’Shevat (the New Year of the Trees), February 6, 1985
It’s snowing like the end of the world, but they’re outside anyway, battling through the slush and the biting wind. Elio spent the night at Oliver’s, since he doesn’t have classes today until afternoon, and this morning they’re completely out of groceries. Besides, Oliver wants to pick up a few things for Esther; he worries about her going out when it’s like this.
Even making it to the corner store feels like an achievement. They tumble inside to a warm greeting from Mr. Yıldız, the owner. Oliver used to think the man taciturn, but he’s clearly charmed by Elio. Free samples of halvah, every time.
“Cold enough for you?” Mr. Yıldız asks. He and Elio fall into conversation, while Oliver scans the aisles for essentials. He glances back to see Mr. Yildiz breaking off a chunk of halvah, the marbled chocolate kind this time, and Elio accepting it with a grin.
Oliver rolls his eyes at Elio, and Elio waggles his eyebrows in response.
“Hard to believe, right now, that it’ll ever be summer again,” Elio says, when they’re back out on the sidewalk, bundled again in their scarves and coats. Northern Italy has winter, yes, but not quite like this. It’s been a delight to watch Elio marvel at it.
“Hey,” Oliver suggests, “whenever spring finally comes, we’ll go upstate for a weekend, okay? Find someplace with a maple sugar festival, go for walks in the woods. You’ll see that New York is a whole lot more than just the city.”
“Sounds good,” Elio says, his face upturned to the swirling snow. Without having to look, he reaches out and finds Oliver’s hand, and takes it in his. They continue up the block like that, hand in hand.
Oliver doesn’t even realize he’s grinning until Elio turns to him and says, “What?” Oliver shakes his head; he’s not sure he has words for it.
He thinks of Elio a year and a half ago, at the start of that summer: a gangly kid walking into his father’s study, reaching out to shake Oliver’s hand for the first time. Could Oliver have known that kid would upend his whole life?
But he did, he did, he did.
Oliver lifts his own face to the snow and feels the perfect, tiny sting of each flake as it falls cold against his face. Summer has heat and passion, but winter is its own kind of perfection.
He looks at Elio, takes in his bright eyes and wind-burned cheeks, the dusting of snowflakes in his unruly hair. Impossible. Precious. And, incredibly, no longer half a world and a long-distance phone call away.
Oliver says, knowing Elio will hear the words behind the words, “I’m glad you’re here.”
The End
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
End notes:
Some Yiddish and Hebrew vocabulary:
bubbe (Yiddish) = grandmother
bubeleh (Yiddish) = term of endearment for a child
Haggadah (Hebrew) = the text that guides a seder
seder (Hebrew) = the ritual to celebrate Passover, structured around a meal
sukkah (Hebrew) = simple, temporary structure in which to celebrate Sukkot
~
The Leonard Cohen song in the third section is “The Guests” from his 1979 album “Recent Songs.”
I can’t tell you how badly I wanted to use the line “And every breath we drew was hallelujah” from, yes, “Hallelujah.” (That’s where the idea for that section started, because that line seems so Elio/Oliver!) “Hallelujah” was released on “Various Positions” in late 1984, so I even could have made it fit in the timeline here… but the more romantic/less darkly religious alternate version that includes the line in question (the version that later got covered by John Cale, Jeff Buckley, et al., and thus is better known to the world) apparently didn’t come out until a Leonard Cohen 1988 live album. Drat!
So, please imagine Oliver and Elio a few years into their future, listening to “Hallelujah.” And, while they’re at it, “Take This Waltz” (1986), the other song I’d wanted to use here. :-)
.
(Crossposted from this post on Dreamwidth, which is now my primary journal. Comments are fine in either place.)
WILL WONDERS EVER CEASE
Fandom: Call Me By Your Name
Summary: Elio moves to New York. (Glimpses of their new life together, set across the course of one year.)
Characters: Oliver, Elio, OC
Words: 3,700
Notes:
A New York coda to the series “He Thinks of Elio.” Thank you to Tessiebear81, whose comment got me thinking about this! It will probably make the most sense if you’ve read the rest of the series (or at least part 3, “Wasted My Life Playing Dumb”). But you could also get by if you just know the following:
When Oliver returned to New York after his summer with the Perlmans, trying to figure out what to do now that Elio had upended his life, he made friends with his elderly (and awesome) neighbor Esther. Her wisdom and perspective gave him just enough of a nudge towards making a different decision than in canon: daring to try to make things work with Elio despite his fears, and visiting him that winter for Hanukkah. Now a month or so has passed since that wintertime visit in Italy, and it’s the beginning of 1984.
Just to keep with the theme of the series, the title is of course from Sufjan Stevens, from “Mystery of Love.”
(This is a set of vignettes over the course of a year, each taking place on a different Jewish holiday - though as you’ll see, some relate more directly to the holiday in question than others.)
Previously in this series:
Sweetly, Before the Mystery Ends
Be My Rest, Be My Fantasy
Wasted My Life Playing Dumb
Sea Lion Caves in the Dark
Read this fic on AO3, or here below:
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Tu B’Shevat (the New Year of the Trees), January 19, 1984
“I swear I saw a tree today that was starting to bud. Just the tiniest green beginnings of leaves.”
Elio’s laugh through the phone line is the most welcome sound. “Did you call me just to tell me about a tree?”
Oliver wraps the phone cord around one finger, spiraling and un-spiraling it. He tries to let the sound of his smile come through in his voice. “It made it seem as if spring were almost here, even though it’s still January. It feels like an age since Hanukkah.”
“And a million years until April.”
“It’s three months until April,” Oliver corrects, laughing.
“More or less the same thing,” Elio counters, and Oliver can’t argue with that.
It’s afternoon here, with winter sun streaming in through the window of Oliver’s apartment, which means it’s evening in Italy. Oliver is in his favorite perch: tipped back in an old hard-backed wooden chair, one foot up on the windowsill, looking out over his city. And Elio at the other end of the phone line.
“You know, Esther keeps asking me when you’re coming. Did I tell you she always refers to you as my ‘young Italian man’?” Oliver rocks further back in his chair, letting the phone cord swing beside him, and does a passable impression. “‘When is your young Italian man coming?’ ‘Wasn’t your young Italian man supposed to visit?’ ‘When do I get to meet your young Italian man?’”
Elio’s reply is a full-throated laugh. “I don’t know how I feel about being reduced to mere attributes. I’m more than my nationality and age.”
Oliver leans into the receiver, as if that could bring Elio closer. “Well, it’s better than what she calls me. I’ve heard her on the phone a couple of times, talking to friends, and it’s always ‘the nice young man’. ‘Oh, Oliver’s visiting me right now, you know, the nice young man from across the street.’”
On the other end of the phone line, Elio sounds like he’s about to collapse from mirth. “If only she knew what you’re really like.”
“If only she knew,” Oliver agrees, smirking. “If only she knew what I’m thinking right now. If only she knew everything I plan to do to you when you visit in April.”
Elio’s breath hitches. “You’re going to kill me.”
“I certainly hope not. But I plan to do everything else one person can do to another. Everything we haven’t even thought of yet.”
“Don’t stop.”
“Never.”
Into the ragged breaths of their silence, Elio whispers, “I miss you.”
Space gapes open inside Oliver’s chest when Elio talks like that. Italy is so far away.
“I miss you too. Never doubt it.” Oliver says it quietly, even though there’s no one around to overhear. But those words are only ever for Elio.
*
Pesach (Passover), April 16, 1984
“So this is your young Italian man. Even more handsome than his photograph.” Esther reaches up to pull Elio’s head down towards her, so she can plant a kiss on each of his cheeks. Elio blushes, extravagantly and charmingly.
Feeling bold, Oliver steps closer and rests one hand against Elio’s back. “We only have him for a few days, while he’s look at colleges. But I’m glad the timing worked out with Passover. Thanks for inviting us, Bubbe Esther.”
He hands Esther the bottle of wine he brought, the sickly sweet Manischewitz stuff that somehow Passover isn’t complete without.
“Thank you, bubeleh.” Esther gives Elio’s cheek one last pat, then accepts the wine from Oliver and takes it to the table, already laid for the seder and the meal. Her movements, as always, are small and precise within the neatly arranged space of her home.
Although Oliver knows Esther mainly as a solitary being, they’re not the only strays she’s collected for her seder tonight. There’s Judy, the daughter of some distant cousin; she’s currently studying in New York and thus has found herself drawn under Esther’s wing. And Rafael, who used to do odd jobs for Esther, but now, she says, is like family.
They gather at the table and Esther hands a Haggadah to each of them. It’s a tight squeeze, here at Esther’s little table in her tiny apartment. Oliver’s leg presses against Elio’s under the table, and Elio grins.
They fall into an easy rhythm, each taking turns reading from the Haggadah, and all joining in on the blessings: over the candles, the wine, the ritual foods. When they reach the four questions, usually asked by the youngest child in a family, Esther reaches over to tap Elio’s shoulder.
He ducks his head, looking embarrassed at being so clearly singled out, an eighteen-year-old among more unequivocal adults. But he chants the questions in clear, confident Hebrew: Mah nishtanah halailah hazeh mikol haleilot…
Like everything about Elio’s impossible, effortless brilliance, it’s an utter turn-on.
When it’s time for the meal, it’s clear Esther has produced a feast. Everything has been made from scratch in her tiny kitchen: kugel and borscht and gefilte fish and tzimmes and of course matzah ball soup. She urges them to take seconds and then thirds, and Oliver can see her thinking very loudly that Elio is too thin. She nudges dish after dish toward him and beams when he accepts.
Judy, it turns out, is a classical music buff, and over the meal she and Elio wander onto conversational tangents no one else can follow. Rafe is quieter, a little shy, but by the end of the night he and Elio are debating obscure French poets.
Oliver’s glance happens to catch on Esther, as the others are listening raptly to Elio relating a story from one of his archeological outings with his dad. Esther reaches over to pat Oliver’s hand. Under the cover of the others’ conversation, she leans in and says close to his ear, in that very sure way she has, “Yes. He’s right for you.”
Much later, in Oliver’s bed, he and Elio are drifting back into quiet, drunk on Passover wine and each other’s nearness. The bedroom window is wide open despite the spring chill and Elio is pressed close, his face mashed warm into Oliver’s chest, clearly sliding toward sleep.
“Did you like Esther?” Oliver asks, carding his hand through Elio’s damp curls. The newness of this, of Elio in his bed, in his city. His heart might burst with it.
“Mm-hm,” Elio mumbles into Oliver’s skin. “Someone who wants to feed me that much, what’s not to like?”
Oliver laughs, and feels Elio’s answering laugh rumble against his chest.
Then Elio shifts, peering up at Oliver in the almost-dark. He sounds fully awake again when he says, “Besides, she loves you. That’s what matters.”
*
Havdalah (the end of Shabbat, and the start of each new week), Saturday, September 1, 1984
“And no one knows where the night is going…” Leonard Cohen rasps from Oliver’s scratchy old turntable, over a plaintive violin. Oliver runs his hand over the curve of Elio’s shoulder, and Elio arches into his touch.
It’s a Saturday night in New York and they could be anywhere right now, out there in the life of the city. But for tonight they’re simply here, tangled in Oliver’s bed as they have been for hours, alternately passionate and languorous. It’s a holy small window of time: Elio has moved into his dorm, but not yet started classes, and they have these few brief days for nothing but each other.
Time feels fleeting, even now that Elio is here to stay.
“And those who dance, begin to dance
Those who weep, begin…”
Oliver leans in and kisses his way from Elio’s shoulder to his collarbone. “I love this spot,” he mumbles into that delicate wing of bone.
“I know you do.” Elio shivers as Oliver’s lips brush his skin.
“Am I that predictable?”
“Not predictable. But…very intent.”
Oliver slides down until his head rests on Elio’s chest, his ear nestled against the steady beat of Elio’s heart, which taps a rhythm lightly offset from the music.
“I was obsessed with Leonard Cohen as a kid,” Oliver muses, his eyes on the record player across the room. “When I was 13 or 14, I would hole up in my room and listen to him over and over. Even though I doubt I understood much of it, at that age. My very normal parents must have wondered how they’d created such a strange, intense child.”
“You?” Elio says, all his disbelief in that word.
“Yes, me,” Oliver chuckles. “You have this invulnerable image of me, but that’s the kind of kid I was. Awkwardly intense and reading poetry when I was supposed to be, I don’t know, going to school dances and football games. It’s a learned skill, you know, acting the way people expect you to act. It took a long time to learn to be as perfect as I am now.”
Elio pinches him in the side, laughing. “You’re so full of yourself!”
Oliver flips onto his stomach, so he can press his mouth to Elio’s ribs. “You’re not arguing with the perfection, though.”
“So full of yourself.” Elio reaches down to rub Oliver’s hair, ruffling it so it stands on end. “Wish I could have known you then, though.”
“Oh god, don’t even say that. When I was 13, you were -”
“Ugh, shut up, shut up!” Elio claps his hand over Oliver’s mouth.
Oliver retaliates by biting it, getting his teeth satisfyingly latched into the softest part of Elio’s palm. They struggle back and forth for a bit, and somehow end up with Oliver on his back and Elio sprawled across his chest, trying to bite his shoulder. Oliver fends him off with one hand as Elio flails at him, as uncoordinated as he is eager.
“You wild animal,” Oliver says, and he hears in his own voice how helplessly fond he sounds.
“You started it,” Elio retorts.
Oliver kisses him deeply, with the pretense of shutting him up.
“Are you excited to start classes?” Oliver asks, when his mouth is free to speak again.
“Yeah.” Even without looking, he can hear the smile that curls into Elio’s voice.
“It’s the start of a whole new chapter for you,” Oliver says, keeping his voice light. He presses his hand into Elio’s back, drawing him down, drawing him closer.
“You worried?” Elio lets himself be drawn in, sliding both his hands under Oliver’s back.
“No.” Maybe.
“There will always be a place for you, Oliver,” Elio whispers, his mouth close to Oliver’s throat, his breath damp and hot. “There’s always a place for you, no matter what else.”
Oliver shivers as those words whisper over his skin. He takes Elio’s face in both his hands and pulls him near, until their mouths collide and their bodies melt into a single rhythm of desire.
Into the darkness, Leonard sings, “Oh, love, I need you, I need you, I need you, I need you, oh, I need you now…”
*
Sukkot (harvest festival), October 10, 1984
“This is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever done,” Elio declares. He’s leaning a little too far out the window of Oliver’s apartment, stretching to attach decorative gourds to the frame Oliver has rigged up outside the window, made of scrap wood and twigs.
“See, the problem with saying that is, I know you. So I know it’s not true.” Oliver has Elio firmly by the belt loops, even though it’s probably unnecessary. But just in case.
Elio pulls himself back inside, red-cheeked and grinning. “All I’m saying is, I’ve never made a sukkah outside a window before.”
“Well, be fair, I haven’t either.”
The truth is, it never felt like there was much point in going to such lengths to celebrate holidays, when it was only for him alone.
Even now, what they’ve made is at most a sukkah in miniature, one that just barely passes the tests of “you can shelter under it (if you stick your head out the window far enough)” and “you can see the stars through the branches (if New York weren’t a world of light pollution).”
“It’s very nice.” Elio gives Oliver’s arm a conciliatory pat. “For a first attempt.”
“Hey!” As usual, Oliver’s mock indignation and Elio’s buoyant laughter lead them into a shoving match, with laughter and grappling and the sinuous slide of skin beneath hands. They end up both breathing hard, with Elio’s back against the wall by the window and Oliver framing his body with both arms.
Oliver leans in and kisses him, slowly. Deliberately. It is a simple, exquisite pleasure to kiss Elio like this, any time he likes. If Elio stays in New York a million years, Oliver could still never learn to take this for granted.
“Hey,” Elio murmurs, between presses of his lips to Oliver’s. “We should show off our very impressive sukkah to Esther. Why don’t you call her? She could look right out her window and see it from there.”
Oliver disentangles himself from Elio only enough to reach for the phone, in its perch on the little table next to the window. This is where Oliver used to sit to talk to Elio in Italy, watching as the seasons changed outside.
Oliver dials Esther’s number and flicks the spiral phone cord out of his way. Elio ducks in under Oliver’s arm so they’re standing side by side, framed in the window.
“Hello, Bubbe Esther?” Oliver says when she picks up. “It’s me, Oliver. Are you close enough to a window that you could look out across the street?”
Across the way, one of her windows slowly lifts and Esther’s small white-haired head pokes out.
“We made a sukkah,” Oliver tells her over the phone, feeling an odd mixture of absurdity and pride. “A rather nontraditional one, but still.”
“Oh, you clever boys,” Esther says. Even from across the way, he can see her smile. “Isn’t that lovely?”
“You should come over sometime,” Oliver suggests. “We can have a meal together here by the window. It’s almost like being in a real sukkah.”
Beside him, Elio leans closer to the phone and calls, “Yes, come over, Bubbe! And I don’t know what Oliver is talking about, because our sukkah is totally a real one.”
Oliver gives Elio a very skeptical double eyebrow raise and mouths, Oh, so now you think it’s good enough?
It earns him a smirk in response.
They make a plan with Esther for the next evening, and Oliver hangs up the phone. Outside, a few yellow leaves drift past the window, carried on an updraft. The air smells fresh and new, despite the traffic below.
It’s fall in New York. It’s Sukkot everywhere. And here in this apartment, Oliver and Elio lean against the window frame, side by side, looking out over their city.
*
Hanukkah (festival of lights), December 18, 1984
“Are you sure you want me to come with you this time?”
Elio looks up from where he’s leaning over his open suitcase, shoving shirts into it without regard for order or wrinkles. “What? Why wouldn’t I want you to come?”
Oliver rubs a hand through his hair, ducking his head as though that will make him fit better into this space. He always feels out of place here in Elio’s dorm room: too tall, too old, too much. This is a place for being eighteen, for trying out all the world’s possibilities and not knowing what will happen next from day to day. As a grown man with a career and an apartment and a host of professional responsibilities, Oliver has no business being here.
To Elio he says, “Your first trip home, you might want to see your parents on your own. That’d be fine.”
They both bought plane tickets, but Oliver’s could surely be changed if necessary. Pro and Mrs. P might want a chance to see their son without an interloper, no matter how much they like that interloper. And Elio -
Well, Elio might want somewhere that’s just for him, for once.
Elio straightens up from his half-packed suitcase, frowning. “I can see my parents even if you’re there. And besides, they want to see you. Do you know how often my mom asked me to make sure you were coming for Hanukkah?” The frown gets deeper, shading into confusion. “Wait, you don’t want to come?”
“Of course I want to come.” Oliver drops down onto Elio’s twin bed; its flimsy frame protests.
Elio plops down next to him, and butts his head against Oliver’s shoulder. “But…?”
They know each other too well by now to hide any subtext. Of course Elio can hear that there are words behind these words.
Oliver sighs, and reaches up to stroke Elio’s curls, where they flop against the collar of Oliver’s shirt. “I’ve moved into every part of your life. Doesn’t it ever bother you? Don’t you want a chance to just be a college student, and do the things college students do?”
“I do the things college students do.”
It’s true, Elio somehow knew by instinct how to be smart about this. He has a life with Oliver, but he has a life with his classmates, too. He goes to parties and concerts and meals with friends; he seems to be universally liked. The pensive Elio who used to hang back and observe the summer social scene in Italy is becoming an Elio at ease with everyone.
Maybe it’s only Oliver who’s still learning his way into this new life.
“I just think sometimes,” he says softly into Elio’s hair, “if you get tired of this, would you know how to say so? Would you tell me?”
“I won’t ever get tired of you. But yeah, if I did, you’d know.”
Elio’s arms come around Oliver’s chest, and his face presses into Oliver’s neck.
“Elio,” Elio whispers.
“Oliver,” Oliver murmurs. It gives him a thrill every time, his own name spoken for Elio.
Elio sighs, a warm exhale, and squeezes him tighter. “Are you going to stop being stupid now and let me pack, so we can go to Italy tomorrow?”
“Not until I’ve done this.” Oliver turns Elio’s face so he can kiss him, hard and deep. Even though they’re in a dorm room. Even though Elio’s roommate could walk in at any time. In this moment, it’s a necessary risk.
“I want you with me in Italy,” Elio says between kisses. “I always want you in Italy.”
“And in New York?”
“I definitely always want you in New York. Besides…”
“Besides…?” Oliver prompts.
“Besides, it’s Hanukkah. Just like it was Hanukkah last year, when you came back.”
Elio and Oliver, Oliver and Elio. They began in summer, yes, in sun-soaked afternoons and longing glances and humid nights. But it was in winter that Oliver threw his caution to the wind and his heart on the line, and made the choice to return to Elio.
“I’d like to light candles with your family again,” Oliver says. He knows Elio can hear the subtext: that Oliver too is remembering that winter visit, those delirious first days of realizing there might be a future for them after all.
“And make latkes.”
“Oh, yes. We are definitely making latkes.”
“And you’ll let Vimini beat you at chess?”
“We both know it’s not like I have a choice.”
Elio laughs. Then he leans close and whispers, “Come home with me, Oliver.”
Home. It is, isn’t it? A kind of home for both of them.
*
Tu B’Shevat (the New Year of the Trees), February 6, 1985
It’s snowing like the end of the world, but they’re outside anyway, battling through the slush and the biting wind. Elio spent the night at Oliver’s, since he doesn’t have classes today until afternoon, and this morning they’re completely out of groceries. Besides, Oliver wants to pick up a few things for Esther; he worries about her going out when it’s like this.
Even making it to the corner store feels like an achievement. They tumble inside to a warm greeting from Mr. Yıldız, the owner. Oliver used to think the man taciturn, but he’s clearly charmed by Elio. Free samples of halvah, every time.
“Cold enough for you?” Mr. Yıldız asks. He and Elio fall into conversation, while Oliver scans the aisles for essentials. He glances back to see Mr. Yildiz breaking off a chunk of halvah, the marbled chocolate kind this time, and Elio accepting it with a grin.
Oliver rolls his eyes at Elio, and Elio waggles his eyebrows in response.
“Hard to believe, right now, that it’ll ever be summer again,” Elio says, when they’re back out on the sidewalk, bundled again in their scarves and coats. Northern Italy has winter, yes, but not quite like this. It’s been a delight to watch Elio marvel at it.
“Hey,” Oliver suggests, “whenever spring finally comes, we’ll go upstate for a weekend, okay? Find someplace with a maple sugar festival, go for walks in the woods. You’ll see that New York is a whole lot more than just the city.”
“Sounds good,” Elio says, his face upturned to the swirling snow. Without having to look, he reaches out and finds Oliver’s hand, and takes it in his. They continue up the block like that, hand in hand.
Oliver doesn’t even realize he’s grinning until Elio turns to him and says, “What?” Oliver shakes his head; he’s not sure he has words for it.
He thinks of Elio a year and a half ago, at the start of that summer: a gangly kid walking into his father’s study, reaching out to shake Oliver’s hand for the first time. Could Oliver have known that kid would upend his whole life?
But he did, he did, he did.
Oliver lifts his own face to the snow and feels the perfect, tiny sting of each flake as it falls cold against his face. Summer has heat and passion, but winter is its own kind of perfection.
He looks at Elio, takes in his bright eyes and wind-burned cheeks, the dusting of snowflakes in his unruly hair. Impossible. Precious. And, incredibly, no longer half a world and a long-distance phone call away.
Oliver says, knowing Elio will hear the words behind the words, “I’m glad you’re here.”
The End
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
End notes:
Some Yiddish and Hebrew vocabulary:
bubbe (Yiddish) = grandmother
bubeleh (Yiddish) = term of endearment for a child
Haggadah (Hebrew) = the text that guides a seder
seder (Hebrew) = the ritual to celebrate Passover, structured around a meal
sukkah (Hebrew) = simple, temporary structure in which to celebrate Sukkot
~
The Leonard Cohen song in the third section is “The Guests” from his 1979 album “Recent Songs.”
I can’t tell you how badly I wanted to use the line “And every breath we drew was hallelujah” from, yes, “Hallelujah.” (That’s where the idea for that section started, because that line seems so Elio/Oliver!) “Hallelujah” was released on “Various Positions” in late 1984, so I even could have made it fit in the timeline here… but the more romantic/less darkly religious alternate version that includes the line in question (the version that later got covered by John Cale, Jeff Buckley, et al., and thus is better known to the world) apparently didn’t come out until a Leonard Cohen 1988 live album. Drat!
So, please imagine Oliver and Elio a few years into their future, listening to “Hallelujah.” And, while they’re at it, “Take This Waltz” (1986), the other song I’d wanted to use here. :-)
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(Crossposted from this post on Dreamwidth, which is now my primary journal. Comments are fine in either place.)