Work Text:
Milan, February 2007
Bellini hadn’t even wanted to go to the damn biennial assembly. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith was a notoriously cronyist, undiscerning body, where no real theologian (meaning anyone with anything interesting to say) would deign to show his face. It was, however, an ideal opportunity for a comparatively-young upstart scrambling to secure a Curial career to make connections and build familiarity with assembly procedure. Bellini’s supervisor seemed to think so anyway, and so the canon-law-professor-turned-Vatican-consultor had been begrudgingly shipped off to Venice to “report on potential developments” which may concern the Dicastery for Legislative Texts in the near future. Ha! As if the Doctrinal Congregation gave a hoot about canon legality.
It was all so embarrassing: the back-patting, the reciprocal favors, the old flames and white whales. Anyone who thought the Catholic faith was governed by scriptural interpretation alone would be sorely disappointed to see what went on in these congregational meetings, to say nothing of the sorry buffet lunches. The discussions, of course, were asinine. It was all the same old arguments about “threats” to Church sanctity and unity and outreach strategies that anyone with even minimal presence in the lay world knew were hopeless. Bellini had heard more nuanced and spirited debate on such topics by his first year students, and they at least pretended to have read the texts they were citing. He spent the first day and a half in a state of intellectual outrage which quickly simmered down into abject boredom.
Halfway through the second day, during a panel discussion on the limits of interfaith tolerance, a grating voice snapped him out of his stupor. Well, it wasn’t so much the voice itself, but the fact that the entire room fell to a dead hush when it emerged. Bellini discerned a thick, growling southern accent — an odd one, definitely not Neapolitan or Sicilian — so idiosyncratic that he had to strain to understand what the man was saying.
“Why beat around the bush? We all know exactly where these concessions lead! The liberal factions will advocate for tolerance and inclusion to our very death! They don’t care about tradizione or maintaining proper rituals; they would water down the faith to nothing if it meant enticing a few protestanti back to the Mass. They would have us all holding hands and singing the liturgy in English — bah! — with every heretic under the sun in the name of tolerance!”
He spat the last word, then leaned back in his seat with a huff, arms crossed. To Bellini’s continued shock, the man fished around in a pocket of his cassock and pulled out a crumpled pack of cigarettes, then lit up right there at the table. He took a drag, completely unfazed by the little signs throughout the room forbidding the activity, and contorted his mouth slightly to let the smoke billow across the table toward whoever he’d been addressing. Bellini would likely have flickered back into impotent outrage if the fellow didn’t have such compelling stage presence. Without taking his eyes off the smoking man, Bellini leaned over to whisper to the priest sitting beside him.
“Chi è lui?” he asked. The man shot him an incredulous look. Bellini noted a pimple on his chin.
“Who, Bishop Tedesco?” The priest was American. He waited for a look of recognition from Bellini that never came, then smiled. “From the south, but holds a bishopric in the northeast. They say he’s one to watch, if you’re the kind to follow future papabili.”
Bellini blinked at him. “Papabili? He’s not even sixty!” His whisper hissed with indignance. “A man like that could ever be pope. Not in this century.” The priest shrugged and turned his attention back to his notes.
After that, the assembly was no longer a chore for Bellini. Each morning and afternoon session, he would eagerly take his seat at the far edge of the meeting room, bring out his legal pad, and wait for the congregation to file in and settle themselves around the hastily-assembled set of conference tables pushed together in the middle of the room. His fellow observers would take serious notes or doze off in turns, but Bellini sat with rapt attention waiting for the next outburst from Bishop Tedesco. He was fascinated by the man, much in the way you might stare too long at a bit of roadkill on the sidewalk.
Eventually, the bishop occupied his thoughts during mealtimes as well. Bellini couldn’t help but watch the man sail through the room, stopping here and there to schmooze with colleagues or pinch something from the dessert table. He was simultaneously the most charismatic and most repugnant person Bellini had ever laid eyes upon.
On the fourth day of the assembly, during another bout of furtive observation, Bellini realized something else. Tedesco tended to be quite…flirtatious with the other prelates. Rather than scoff at the hypocrisy, Bellini was all the more intrigued. Once he’d gotten a handle on the accent, it became clear that Tedesco’s snide remarks and overly friendly greetings as he made his rounds were filthy, more often than not. He would shake hands with a brother priest, wolfish grin slashed across his face, then deadpan an innuendo vile enough to make Bellini blush, only to release a bellowing laugh as though it wasn’t really meant to be a covert comment to begin with. Odder still, the other prelates routinely laughed at these off-color jokes — which, if Bellini was being charitable, were more appropriate to a bathhouse than the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith — as if there was nothing odd at all about perhaps the most vehemently conservative cleric in Italy propositioning his colleagues over lunch.
He noted, of course, that Tedesco tended to make such comments only among other ultra-conservatives and known entities. The more progressive members of the congregation, and present non-member clergy like Bellini, were exempt from such treatment. That was perhaps the most incendiary part: that this wanton bigot had a free pass to perform homoeroticism among his own faction, but knew better than to be seen making a pass at anyone who might actually respond beyond a polite chuckle and a pat on the shoulder. He badly wanted to laugh about the whole thing with his old group of faculty friends at the Gregorian… They at least would have appreciated the irony.
After a while, Bellini couldn’t help but wonder if it wasn’t a performance at all. He started looking for clues in the man’s demeanor: performing advanced trigonometric calculations on his hand gestures from across the room, looking closely at the elaborately-coiffed curls of his hair when his back was turned. Bellini had lived in Italy for some time by then, and he considered himself an adequate assessor of “gay or European” but Goffredo Tedesco was a confusing case, to say the least. Yet one thing was sure; if he was, and Bellini thought he might be, Tedesco was living a decadent life behind the scenes. His lascivious demeanor precluded anything else. Bellini was dwelling on the subject between lectures when he heard a sound that made him jump out of his skin.
“Hey, pelato.” Bellini wheeled around and found himself face to face with the bishop himself, and noted immediately his ignorance of personal space. Tedesco’s nose was about six centimeters from his own, so close that Bellini could smell the tobacco on his breath.
“Can I be of assistance, Bishop Tedesco?”
“Chi sei? Why are you always staring at me come un ricchione?”
If Bellini had hair it would have been blown backward by the remark. He felt his face get hot, and had the inexplicable sensation of having been caught stealing. At a rare loss for words, he stuttered out a reply in overly polite Italian:
“I— You have my apologies, Your Excellency! I’m only here to observe, and if I’ve been overly attentive—”
“Bah! American. None of you can speak properly.” He was distracted, busy lighting another cigarette indoors. “Chi sei?” he asked a second time.
“My name is Aldo Bellini. I’m a canon law professor consulting for the Dicastery for Legislative Texts. I’m here on orders to report on the assembly.” He felt as though he had been taken prisoner of war and made to provide information at gunpoint. Tedesco grinned.
“A lawyer? Then you know how to lie,” he said matter-of-factly, switching to English.
“Dishonesty is a trait generally frowned upon in priests, I’m afraid.” Bellini tried to match his level of sardonicity and found himself at a rare loss. Tedesco went on.
“Priests should not be lawyers. That is an invention of degenerate liberalism that would have you academics rummaging through scripture for, ah… how do you say… loopholes for sin. God is not that kind of judge, Signor Bellini. He cannot be argued into a corner.” He crossed his arms over his puffed chest with the last line, the picture of self-righteousness. Bellini just stood there, unsure how to respond politely to such a glaring incitement. Before he could decide, the bishop spoke again.
“So. Are you?”
“Am I what?” He asked, feeling his heart in his fingertips.
“Un liberale! What else?” But the way he was smiling made Bellini think he knew damn well what else. He considered his options and decided Tedesco had been right: he did know how to lie.
“No, no, I should think not.” He consciously deepened his voice a bit as he said it, but his tone must not have been very convincing, for Tedesco’s smile withered. His cigarette needed an ashtray. Aldo worried for the ugly hotel carpet. The silence dragged on too long.
Tedesco squinted at him. “And have you been making friends? Getting to know our fratelli? Observing?” The grate of his voice was menacing. Aldo sensed that he couldn’t afford for this man to think he had something on him, even for an instant. He would have to play defense.
“I’ve observed you. I’ve observed that you can be very… friendly.”
Tedesco’s face went the color of his amaranth fascia.
“I don’t know what you mean,” he muttered hoarsely.
“Only that you seem to be a good man to know.”
At this, the bishop nodded and turned away quickly. “Enjoy the conference, Signor Bellini. E tieni gli occhi per te…” he trailed off, already stalking away for a friendlier face. Aldo had won the battle, it seemed, but nevertheless the interaction sent a chill down his spine. He was careful not to be caught staring after that, and accepted with some remorse that the mystery of Tedesco — whether the man’s filthy words went beyond words — would likely never be solved.
The assembly ended on a Saturday morning, to give the attendees ample time to travel home before Mass the following day. Aldo went out for a smoke just in time to see one of Tedesco’s assistants attempt to load the bishop’s luggage into a cab bound for the train station. Aldo had noticed, of course, that throughout the conference Tedesco had a small team of lackey priests who brought him things: a fresh pack of cigarettes, his ostentatious overcoat, the daily agendas. These men were invariably young and invariably handsome, and the one loading the van was no exception to the rule.
It was bitterly cold, with a misting rain that threatened to become sleet. Tedesco huddled under the hotel’s front awning and watched his personal bellboy wrestle one of his suitcases. Aldo watched Tedesco. The look on the bishop’s face could only be described as naked annoyance. He hadn’t noticed Aldo, only a few meters away in front of the automatic lobby door. Finally, peeved with the lackey’s failed attempt to wrangle the suitcase, Tedesco stepped out into the rain and threw an arm over his carefully-coiffed hair. Aldo couldn’t make out the Italian expletive from where he stood; it seemed to have been meant only for the assistant’s ears. One-armed, Tedesco helped with the suitcase, swearing all the while, with such vitriol that Aldo wouldn’t have been shocked if he’d smacked the man.
Instead, after they managed to slam the trunk closed, Tedesco gave the young priest a clap on the shoulder which morphed into an affectionate squeeze and — to Aldo’s utter shock — a genuine, winning smile, diametrically opposed to the one he’d given Aldo the day before. There was real fondness in that smile, not a hint of the lecherous grin that Tedesco flashed around the buffet table. Aldo was transfixed. The priest returned the smile, and for a moment they held each other’s gaze. Tedesco’s hand still hadn’t left the man’s shoulder. Then, as if Aldo weren’t already about to faint, Tedesco leaned forward and said something that made the young priest giggle, and topped it off with a playful tug on the earlobe. The priest caught the older man’s hand and held it for a second, then two, clearly reluctant to let him go.
The moment was so disgustingly sweet that Aldo felt himself violently snapped back into his own body, where a voyeur’s shame and some other rude, humid emotion awaited him. He turned on the heel of his shoe, suddenly eager for the warm safety of the hotel lobby. The mystery was solved, but he felt no sense of satisfaction. In his rush to get away from the holy lovers he’d left his cigarette burning indoors, earning him a disapproving look from the woman behind the check-in desk. She tapped the ‘No Smoking’ sign. He hadn’t even wanted to go to the damn biennial assembly.