Household Gods

Violence. Nicole’s lip started to curl, until she remembered some of the dire threats she’d laid in Lucius before she trusted him on the stepping stones. That made her blush faintly, which didn’t help her mood a bit. “If you’re going to the baths today,” she said to Titus Calidius Severus, “would you be so kind as to take him with you and get him back to the color he’s supposed to be?” She didn’t call Calidius by his praenomen; that would have felt like using it to unfair advantage.

He nodded at once, with every appearance of goodwill. “It’s been a while since I took him, after all, hasn’t it? We could both use a good scrubbing.” He grinned at Lucius. Lucius grinned back. Calidius Severus’ expression changed slightly. “My, and aren’t you getting to be a handsome boy? Just as well your mother sends you with a chaperon. A good-looking boy in the baths by himself – that’s asking for trouble.”

Lucius shrugged and looked bored. Calidius Severus sighed a little. “Well. You’re young yet. That’s to the good, maybe.” To Nicole he said, “Don’t you worry, Umma. I’ll keep a steady eye on him and keep him safe, and bring him back as good as new.”

Nicole shivered deep down inside. She’d only been worried about Lucius alone in the streets. She hadn’t thought about what might happen in the baths. She should have, too. She’d seen what kind of place they were. If prostitutes came and went there on men’s days, if women gossiped about masseurs who provided extra services on the side, why wouldn’t men who went after boys – chkkenhawks. a gay friend of hers had called them – also prowl there? She looked at Titus Calidius Severus with a new respect. “Thank you very much, Titus,” she said, deliberately and carefully calling him by his praenomen.

He noticed. He smiled, nodded. He didn’t press his advantage. Was he really as sensible as that?

Yes, she thought. He was. Which put him several steps ahead of most of the men she’d known in Indiana and California, let alone Carnuntum.

“Come on, Lucius, let’s get you cleaned up,” he said. Lucius came without hesitation or backtalk. Calidius Severus’ tone was familiar to Nicole, though she needed a moment to place it. When she did, she snorted. In 1950s war movies that even sleazy cable stations didn’t show till three in the morning, the tough sergeant used precisely that tone with the green kid. It worked like a charm in the movies. Nicole had never imagined that it could work so well in reality.

Titus Calidius Severus called upstairs to Gaius to explain where he was going and why. His son came down yawning and chewing on a hunk of bread. He shoved the last of it into his mouth and settled without complaint to the work that his father had left – because the work, of course, would not go away.

Titus and Lucius and Nicole left him to it. After the reeking dimness of the shop, the open air was blinding bright and dizzyingly clean.

Lucius, whose young eyes adjusted fastest, tugged at Nicole’s arm and pointed across the street. “Look, Mother! Someone’s written something on our front wall.”

Sure enough, there was a large scrawl by the door. With both eyes on Lucius to keep him from diving back into the mud, Nicole had walked right by without noticing. Now that he’d pointed it out, she read it aloud, sounding out the spikily printed words: “Big beast show in the amphitheater on the thirteenth day before the Kalends of August.” She needed a moment to work out that that was July 20, and another to realize it was only a couple of days away.

“Ah, Caesar’s victory games,” Calidius Severus said, nodding. “They always put on a good show for those. They bring in beasts people don’t see every day, not just the same old boring bulls and bears.” Absurdly, Nicole thought of Wall Street, and wondered if Rome had, after all, had a stock market. The fuller and dyer went on, “Why, a few years ago, they even had a tiger. Do you remember what a mean-looking bastard he was?”

“Now that you remind me of it, yes,” Nicole said, to be safe. No way she was letting him know that her memory of Carnuntum stopped cold less than two months before.

“They may not be able to manage anything that fancy this time, not with that pestilence down in the south and the war tearing up everything off to the west, but it still should be one of the best shows of the year.” Titus Calidius Severus hesitated, then took the plunge: “Would you like to see it with me?”

A date, Nicole thought. I’ve just been asked out on a date. Who says this place hasn’t got any culture? The fuller and dyer’s voice didn’t have anything of and then you’ll put out for me in it, either. She’d heard more than enough of that since Frank walked out. She’d given up on men as a species then, after so many of them had proved that all a man wanted was one thing.