Alcohol and good food warmed the two bodies sitting in the kitchen, one at the sink cleaning the last remains of the day, and the other admiring a subtly colored cake atop the kitchen table. The cake was an elegant white, with simple plum colored accents. It was a perfect cake for Cadeo. Subtle, elegant, beautiful, and tasty-looking.
Keoni sighed, almost like a purr, and glanced at Cadeo, who stood scrubbing plates free of powdered sugar, sauces, and other misceallenous articles of nutrition.
He is twenty-one today, Keoni thought pensively, But he seemed.. Unhappy.
Not that he always didn't, at least a little bit.
Keoni sighed again, with the intention of trying to get his boyfriend's attention. Cadeo sighed back, his responding breath seeming more curt and sharp then Keoni's sing-song exhale.
"What do you want, Keoni?" Cadeo murmured, not looking away from the work in his hands. "You can't have any of that cake yet. You've already had plenty of sugar today."
"That's not even what I was gonna ask, silly!" Keoni laughed, propping his head up on his hands. "What I was going to ask was if you had fun at your party."
"I did," Cadeo responded carefully. "I'm glad you decided to put that together. It was nice to meet the band up for a meeting that wasn't just practice or a triple-date."
"Then why do you seem so unhappy?"
Cadeo paused, turning to look at Keoni for the first time. His expression was hard to read -- it looked tired, and that was all Keoni could really read. His face was always very calm and collected, but all today it'd been... Tense.
"Let's just say it wasn't everything I wanted it to be." Cadeo said, his voice taut. He clearly didn't want to continue this conversation. Unfortunately for him, Keoni hardly understood the meaning of the phrase, "cut that shit out".
"What do you mean? You got presents, even though they weren't stuff you wanted--,"
"Because I said, 'don't get me presents', and yet, there you all were. Giving my presents."
"And the cake is delicious, and gorgeous. What could be missing?" Keoni finished, tilting his head to the side. "What didn't you get that you wanted?"
"... Forty-two candles."
"Excuse me?"
The response had been mumbled, paired with Cadeo's hands setting down the plate and sponge in his hand. His shoulders were hunched, his body language as tense as his words had been.
"What's so special about the candles? You got twenty-one, isn't that enough?" Keoni asked, baffled. "This party was perfect, so why is it the candles-..."
"I wasn't the only one who turned twenty-one today, Keoni." Cadeo said, his voice thick. He ran a hand over his face and sighed. The air in the room had suddenly tensed. It didn't take long for Keoni to match the pieces together.
His heart sank. Of course he'd miss Roland. But from what Keoni remembered, the two of them didn't get along very well. In fact, Roland was always fairly rude to Cadeo. So why did he miss him this much?
"Cadeo... I'm sorry... I thought you wouldn't miss him." Keoni admitted, standing and making a strict B-line to Cadeo, clinging to his waist like a vice. "He was so mean to you, so I just thought-..."
"Keoni... It wasn't his fault." Cadeo's words shook as they fell from his mouth. "I pushed him away. He.. He tried so hard. All the time. For everyone, even if no one but me knew it. But I thought he dragged me down. My parents put me on a pedestal and I thought I belonged on it. Roland didn't do anything wrong."
"Cadeo... Roland did it to himself." Keoni said, holding Cadeo tighter. "He put himself in rehab. He... you know."
"That wasn't his fault!" Cadeo snapped, rising above his usual monotonous volume. His hands shook over the greasy plates, and Keoni could feel his pulse quicken under his arms. Keoni felt his own stomach knot at this sudden rage, and he pulled back out of fear. Cadeo never raised his voice like this. Even when he was mad, he usually got... Quieter. This was a whole new side that Keoni rarely saw.
"It... it was his choice, wasn't it?" Keoni asked, shaking in his shoes. "He didn't have to relapse--"
"He didn't expect to overdose, Keoni!" Cadeo continued, slamming his hands down on the counter. "You don't understand, he-... He struggled, and the only thing keeping him steady after the band was Rodian. After Rodian left him for the drug use and put him in rehab, Roland had NOTHING! You don't understand!"
Cadeo's harsh words struck like ice cold spikes in Keoni's body, and his eyes stung with oncoming tears. He really didn't understand, but there was no reason for Cadeo to yell at him like this!
"I-...I'm sorry, Cade-"
"Oh, you're sorry?" Cadeo cut him off, his tone growing on hysterical. "Tell that to the grave of the little brother I abandoned! You shouldn't be sorry, I should be sorry! It was my fault! He had no one! I should have been there! Me, his brother! I should... I should have.." Cadeo's voice broke, and he ducked his head. Keoni's heart, still chilled from the singer's spiteful words, throbbed with pity and sympathy. Cadeo missed his brother. How could he not? They were twins, it must have been like two adjoined spirits being ripped apart. Poor Cadeo...
Keoni gently took Cadeo's hands, moving closer to him. Once in range, he could see the glistening tracks down the sides of Cadeo's smooth, pale face. Now Keoni's heart ached. He'd never seen Cadeo cry before. Ever. He didn't even think the man could cry. He gently swiped a tear away from his beloved jazz musician's face, which peered at him with such... Genuine pain. He shook his head, trying to turn away from Keoni, who simply hugged him with all his strength. To his credit, Cadeo did elicit a very pained wheeze, but did eventually hug Keoni back.
They stood like that for a while, long after Cadeo's shoulders had stopped shaking.
"I'm... Sorry, Keoni." Cadeo muttered, holding Keoni tight and resting his head upon Keoni's. "I didn't mean to yell. It's just... My first birthday without him."
"It's okay, Cadeo!" Keoni chirped, butting Cadeo's chin with his forehead. "I'm glad you're not sad anymore. So can we have that cake now?"
"... Sure."
"Yes!"
"But you have to do the rest of the dishes."
"Aw, Cadeo!"
Cadeo, though he wouldn't admit it later, smiled for the first time that entire day. He planted a kiss on the crown of Keoni's head, before grabbing two plates from the drying rack and placing them on either side of the gorgeous cake. The cake was soon gone, and both Cadeo and Keoni stood side-by-side at the sink to clean the last of the plates.
It was a pretty good party. But, Keoni had a feeling it would have been just a little better with twenty-one more candles.
