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October 16, 1894

Chère June,

It is love, as pure as any love on earth, and I have not laid even a finger on the boy, I swear to any god or muse you prefer.

He is perfection, the like of which I have never before had the immense pleasure of beholding. Clear olive skin, luminous eyes, face the shape of something carved by the masters of old but living and breathing, lips I could spend eternity tracing with my fingertips, waiting for his pink little tongue to dart out.

The body, of course, is as perfect as the face. As unlike mine as one could hope to encounter. Tall. (But then everyone seems tall to me.) Lean and graceful. (Again, think of with whom I compare.)

The hands! I could never tire of painting them. Delicate birds fluttering in the air. Long expressive fingers, which look elegant holding a cigarette and would still look as elegant holding a monstrosity of a cock such as mine.

No, alas, I have not seen that. Nor, I fear, will I. And that, chéri, is a tragedy too great for words.

He was at Oscar’s soiree the night before last, leaning against the wall in the corner, shining like a beacon among the other renters, who suddenly looked so dull and shallow

Yes, he is a renter. But not like the others. Unlike anything, as I wrote, I have ever seen.

I spent a good part of the evening struck dumb. He moved with a perfect grace. The others looked childish next to his beauty.

Impossible beauty.

You may think I ramble, and if it pleases you, pay no attention to my ramblings. They are obviously coloured by my rampant emotions. And rampant other things.

Oh, yes indeed, I was and I still am flying full mast for this young man. I will be forever, or so it feels, for nothing could possibly help. I could spill my seed a dozen times a day for eternity and the ache would still be there, deep inside, for it is, I fear, something greater than mere lust. And even if it is only lust, it is a lust more powerful than any ordinary mortal has a right to feel.

He looked at me and smiled politely, as I’m sure he’s paid to do. He was very good at it. His eyes betrayed none of the revulsion held in those of his colleagues. They were warm and enticing, the eyes of a lover.

There was a flicker of what I hoped was recognition, but I could not tell if he was recognising me or the quality of my attire. He did seem to be perusing the guests in search of his most profitable option.

I had nothing with which to attract him. I have modest financial resources, not enough to truly compete in a room such as that, full of the rich and reckless and entirely debauched. I refuse to drag my dusty old title out of its closet to impress a pair of pretty brown eyes. That would be humiliating.

Although it would render my father apoplectic, were he ever to discover I used my ill-gotten title to lure a low-class prostitute. And why should I not? It is useless for anything else. It is less than sincere. A third son (my father) does not deserve the title any more than his father, also a third son. That makes me a fraud, perhaps. (And a practically disinherited fraud, at that, but not in this case, as I chose not to flaunt it.)

I draw out the telling of the tale to savour every detail, only because I wish the encounter had lasted longer. If I were to write the bare facts on the page, it would seem so inconsequential, so trivial, you would laugh. You would most certainly laugh if I told you, to your face, how I ache to attain him outside the confines of a business transaction.

There was a slim chance he knew of my work. It seemed he might be of an artistic nature. Those soulful eyes, you know. Eyes of an artist. Or eyes made for an artist to paint and describe forever.

How can I win this one over? Other than my (middling) means, my (fraudulent) title, my artistic reputation (as a rebel and a pervert), I have nothing but a good wardrobe and my sense of humour, which serves to repel as often as it to attract. (The sense of humour repels; the wardrobe is always impeccable, so long as I stay sober enough to avoid falling into puddles.)

Then there is my singularité. It has attracted some. Something to gossip about, as a novelty. But how could a creature of such angelic countenance be in any way attracted to my stunted body and coarse features?

I was at the bar, as is my habit at parties, mixing positively lethal drinks for the other guests. You know how I love to watch them stumble the first time they try to stand after enduring one of my creations. I looked, for the hundredth time of the evening, at mon bel homme, my bellâtre, and he looked back and began to walk toward me.

I lost track of what I was doing. I have no idea what I put in that drink, although I did notice that the gentleman for whom I mixed it was on the floor at the end of the night.

My gorgeous renter draped himself over the bar and gave me a small, tantalising smile. “Monsieur Artiste,” he murmured in a musical voice, soft and low. It reminded me of a flood of sweetened absinthe in my throat.

He knew me.

Not an unlikely occurrence. I am unusual enough that I am easily described. My show has received some attention. But he bothered to let me know that he knew who I was. From that, I took encouragement.

“I am so pleased to see you in the flesh.”

Oh, the sound of his voice pronouncing the word ‘flesh’ gave me shivers!

“Yet I show hardly any flesh at all,’ I replied so flippantly it makes me want to kick myself.

He smiled, no doubt used to quips of that sort. “I have a friend at the British Museum,” he said. “He let me view at your exhibit before it was hung.”

Ah! I had known he was an artist the first time my eyes lit on him. Or that he at least appreciated art.

“He told me about you,” that lilting voice continued, “and mentioned you might attend one of Oscar's… Mister Wilde’s affairs. This is indeed an honour.”

The honour was, of course, mine, but I was too tongue-tied to say so. Can you imagine, chéri? Me, Henri of the notoriously loose tongue, rendered speechless by a renter? Such is his extraordinary beauty. I had to wonder why he would need to rent himself at such a gathering. Surely he could find himself some rich benefactor to take him away from all that. (And surely, if I could find the resources to be that benefactor, I would leap at the chance.)

“Your work is stunning, Monsieur. So passionate and clear.”

“Really?” I managed to stutter.

“No clutter or artifice,” he added confidently.

I recognised the words at once. M. Binyon spoke them to me not a week ago. Perhaps he’d practiced them on this lad. It mattered not. The words sounded heavenly coming from those lips.

“You go straight to the truth of the subject.”

Another quote.

Ordinarily, I would be irked by the lack of imagination and the repetition of another’s critique, but I clung to the slim chance that Binyon had actually been repeating this young man’s opinions of me when we discussed the show.

Also, ordinarily, I also reject such obvious flattery. But that was moot; there was nothing ordinary about this. He could have been reading from a review in the newspaper and I still would have been rapt, waiting on the edge of a knife for that delicious-looking tongue to moisten his lips just one more time.

I was on the verge of offering him a drink when Bosie appeared. Of all people - tall, irksomely handsome, ridiculously rich, shallow, vain, faux-bohemian Bosie! The obnoxious prat leaned close to the renter, offered a cigarette from a silver case and said, in a tone loud enough for all to hear its vulgarity, “I shall fuck you until dawn and you will still want more.”

My angel, my breathtaking beauty, my bel homme looked him in the eye, not one to be trifled with, and said, with a lovely lilt in his voice, “If you’ve got the money.” And a smirk played around those delectable lips.

Bosie was flustered by this surfeit of brashness and uncommon lack of flattery, but recovered quickly and said, “And if you’ve the endurance.”

My beautiful boy smirked and pushed himself off the bar. “Perhaps another night, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,” he purred. I have never liked the sound of my own name so much in my life.

I thrust out a hand quickly, caught him by the arm. “Is that a promise?” I asked.

Silly of me, I know. Too trite. And him but a common renter. But he seemed so much more than that. He is so much more. (And I suppose I did lay a hand on him, but not in any of the places I wanted to lay a hand.)

“I am not in a position to make promises, but even I am allowed to hope,” he said. Silk, his voice was. Silk rustling against my sow’s ears.

I was too shocked to reply.

While Bosie was busying himself procuring a bottle of that swill the English dare to call champagne, my lovely boy dared to lean close, so close I could feel his breath on me. “I should very much like to learn for myself what else those talented hands are capable of creating,” he whispered.

And then we were interrupted. “Amusing yourself with our little friend?” Bosie sneered.

I still have no idea which of us he meant to address. He misses no chance to comment upon my stature, but he might just as well have been denigrating the renter. Bosie is a hypocrite that way. He gladly insults those he is about to fuck.

The lovely renter ignored the question and, with the grace of a jungle cat, sauntered in the direction of the boudoir. And I felt my heart tumble down.

Bosie caught up to him quickly, grabbed him roughly by the arm and tugged him down the hall. I fear it might not have been an easy night of work for the boy, but it was impossible for me to protest. I had no claim on him.

Other than my undying love for him. But to speak that aloud would have been derided to a degree even I could not tolerate.

Later in the evening, after enough barely passable cognac to choke a bull, I gathered the courage to ask the unclaimed renters about him - who is he? where does he live? what is his name? - but all I received was a withering look from the oldest and roughest-looking of the lot. “You need a name? You can call him whatever you like; he’ll only pay attention to your coin.”

I was, I admit, quite drunk by then. I probably did not impress them as a serious suitor. I doubt anyone would be taken seriously by that lot, though.

And that was it.

In the morning my bel homme had vanished with the rest of the renters, and I was on the boat back to France. Life is terribly unfair that way. (I cannot wait until the next time I visit London, and that is something for which I never thought I would yearn in all my days.)

I have some hope: he knows Binyon. That is full of possibilities. And he knows my work, and admires it, or at least he paid enough attention to Binyon’s appraisal of it to memorize the words. I do hope he meant them, even if the words are not his.

That I should care if someone little higher than a street urchin cares for my work might befuddle you, but I have never discriminated on the basis of class. I do not believe in it. Unless I am skewering the rich, in which case I allow myself to be as caustic as necessary without irrevocably gnawing the hand that feeds me.

I have no way of knowing if he was telling the truth, but it felt enough like a truth to take my breath away.

I shall find him again on my next journey. I shall make it a quest.

How much the world can change in a single moment. It is astounding, chéri. Astounding. But I shall never forget the faintness in my heart when I looked directly into those eyes.

I will try for the rest of my life to mix that colour on my palette.

Avec amour,
Henri



Next: Three - Freedom

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