#yeah but now it's timperi

[timperi-fan]

"What are you waiting for?" Irep snapped from his position on the ground. He was injured and exhausted, being held at wand-point by Wanda. "Kill him!"

Peri hovered in place, visibly struggling with the order. His eyes shone pink and his pupils were hazy, like he had come down with a terrible fever. His hands shook where he gripped his scepter, and he was sweating with exertion, clearly fighting himself.

"You need to leave," Peri demanded shakily, his scepter fighting to stay level as he aimed it at his foe. "I can't— I c-can't fight it forever."

Timmy didn't move, taking in Peri's haggard appearance and the conflicting thoughts warring on his face.

The biggest indicator that something was wrong with Peri was the small, diamond-shaped scar between the base of his wings, carrying through his chest to just below his sternum. The magical injury was visible even through Peri's clothes, and every fairy knew what it meant.

Timmy hadn't known, when he first arrived in Fairy World, what he was dealing with. Hazel had filled him in on the way, yapping his ear off and stumbling over sentences as she dragged him along.

He knew what it meant now.

And he wasn't going anywhere, Cupid's Curse be damned.

So, instead of leaving, Timmy stepped closer. And closer still. He knew that they had an audience, that Peri was dangerous, that he still only had half of his lost memories, that all of the odds were against him, that there was a very slim chance of this working—

But all he could think was that Peri looked like he was in so much pain, and how was Timmy supposed to see that and just walk away?

"It's okay," Timmy said soothingly, his hands held out placatingly. "I'm not going to hurt you, Peri. No one is going to hurt you."

"That's not what I'm worried about," Peri whispered.

"Stop talking and shoot—!" Irep's furious demand was cut off when Cosmo shoved a sock into his mouth.

All that Cosmo and Wanda could do was worriedly watch the scene unfolding before them. They didn't know how Timmy had gotten here, or why his memories were coming back, but they trusted him. They always had before.

"I'm not leaving," Timmy said firmly. "I promise."

Peri wailed. "Don't say that! You can't promise me that, you've said that before, and you still—" He paused, eyes widening. "You remember."

It wasn't a question.

Timmy nodded. "Yeah, I do."

Instead of being relieved, Peri's expression crumbled. "Oh, no. You must hate me. You do, don't you? You're— And I lied to you, and—"

"Stop that," Timmy cut in sharply. Peri was working himself up, his scepter flaring with magic that was ready to burst out at any moment. "I don't hate you. I could never hate you, Per. You're my little brother."

Peri laughed. He laughed so hard that he was sobbing, breaking down, collapsing in on himself like a dying star. "I never thought there would come a day when I didn't want to hear you say that, but here it is! Go away, Timmy — I can't control myself, I'm going to hurt you if you stay."

"But it will hurt you if I leave." Headless of the dangers, Timmy finally closed the distance between them.

He ignored Peri's scepter, letting it dig into his chest. The contact burned a hole through the fabric, and quickly reddened Timmy's skin from the heat. Peri winced, his hands shaking so violently now that it was a wonder his scepter didn't fall from his grasp.

"I've never given up on you before, and I'm not going to start now." Timmy reached his hand out and cupped Peri's cheek. The brush of their skin made Peri gasp, eyes flashing, magic wavering. "I love you, Peri. I'm not going anywhere — not this time."

And Timmy leaned in, but Peri was the one who surged forward, clinging to Timmy the way that the tides clawed at the shore. He dropped his scepter and tilted Timmy's face down, their lips meeting in a crushing kiss. Their onlookers gasped in mixes of shock and disgust, but neither Peri nor Timmy paid them any mind.

The months they'd spent together as strangers, becoming friends and then something more, pining and longing for different things, accepting whatever closeness they could get, filling those empty spaces inside of themselves with each other— all of it had built up to this.

Peri felt the arrow lodged in his chest splinter and snap, and he could breathe again.

He breathed in Timmy, his big brother, his lover, his missing pieces — the scent of his cologne, his sweat, the burnt aura of magic clinging to him still. Peri inhaled it like he was never going to draw breath again.

Timmy's hand cupped his back, using his thumb to rub circles into the spot where Cupid's Curse had scarred. But that scar was fading now, and Peri's eyes were back to their normal, bright purple when he leaned back and met Timmy's gaze.

He sniffled, feeling wrung dry. "You don't hate me?" Peri asked, just to be sure.

"Hm. I don't know..." Timmy pretended to think about it. "Maybe we should kiss again, just to be sure."

Peri laughed, and it was the best thing that Timmy had ever heard. They kissed again, softer this time but no less intense, letting the world fall away as they lost themselves in the love that they thought they'd never get to have.

While Wanda helped Jorgen get Irep into chains, Hazel stood next to Cosmo and watched the proceedings with wide eyes.

"What just happened?" She asked, whispering, as if speaking too loud would shatter the moment.

Cosmo had an odd look on his face, like he wasn't quite sure what he was feeling. After a moment, he turned to Hazel. "Well, you know what they say." He shrugged, looking a little dumbfounded. "The only way to break a Curse is with True Love's Kiss."

[editionsdepress]

APATHY AND PHYSICAL ISSUES: A LORENZO MATTEUCCI INTERVIEW

Welcome to the first interview on the DE PRESS blog. Expect more to come from both our artists and other exciting voices in publishing, drawings, alt comics etcetera. Our first guest is Lorenzo Matteucci, longtime DE PRESS author with the Hommage series and his new zine, Lavoisier.

Hello Lorenzo, how you doin’?

Allright thanks.

Before getting into Lavoisier I’m curious about your past experiences. Your curriculum goes from design into illustration, but then your DE PRESS publications are mostly comics.

Yes I wasn’t expecting that too - I was even studying Contemporary Art before all that.

I like to think I was looking for some way to express myself in a more personal way, but I know that I ended up doing illustrations because I want to work as little as possible.

Speaking of which, doing a comic for DE PRESS was quite unusual, I have a troubled, complex and painful relationship with long drawing sessions, I don’t like to keep drawing the same characters in the same stories. My father calls me “Er Lavativo” [*roman slang for “skiver”]

Rare portrait of my father calling me and my friends “hobos” done in high school years by my friend Davide.

Speaking of your early works - the two issues of Hommage - you did experiment with comics and 3D graphics as well, what’s the reason for all this complex technicalities?

I was making it easier actually! I was really lazy and had some health issues at the time. I had some nerve injuries so basically two fingers in my dominant hand went AWOL. I could still use a mouse with my other fingers so I could do digital drawings and I wanted to dust 3D softwares off.

I did some pages and was quite happy with the results (even tho it was the beginning of a painful process) so I threw Simone (Proietti Timperi) aka Simoncino in the mix. He’s a Tennessee rap expert and we had history together involving some crazy college adventures, like eating Burger King at every lunch break for an entire week.

A great collaboration flourished, we had a lot of fun designing the whole comic together and making up apparently unreal stories.

I think Lavoisier and Hommage share some aspects of this workflow, even though you used a different technique and style. I feel like you keep approaching drawing as a design thing, starting with technical issues and getting creative working on that, does this make any sense?

Yes it does make sense, that’s true. There’s various reasons for this - my studies, my perfectionism, my interest into doing something new. I like choosing paper stocks, checking out the prints, doing things a little different from my usual practice. Self-publishing for me is all about experimenting and leisure.

Lavoisier is certainly less “comic” oriented than Hommage, but it’s still strongly focused on precise yet subtle narration, how difficult was to achieve this?

I had the story in my mind for a while, but I got to admit that translating that into a series of single illustrations was hard. I also had to pick stuff that I’d like to draw.

Any thoughts on the cover?

Look at that subtle off-white coloring. The tasteful thickness of it. Oh my God, it even has a DE PRESS watermark

Speaking of your regular activity, are you ok about describing it as “freelance illustrator”?

Yeah you could say that.

[Mom says “bank transfer done”]

When you do a freelance work, is there any conflict between your doing personal research as an author and meeting the client’s expectations and/or the client’s desire to just get a certain “style” that he/she likes or feels right for the job?

The sooner you understand “author” and “client” have a hard time coexisting (for debutants especially) the sooner you can work without that weight on your heart.

Everyone’s going to ask for editing and adjustments, from the concept to the final. Sometimes art directors will ask a specific subject to draw. What I prefer to focus on (and keep working on) is my illustration’s recognizability. I care to express my mood and persona and looking at oneself through one’s own work is the funniest, most gratifying aspect of the job.

Right now I think there’s even too much hype and chit-chat around illustration. It’s something of a trend, for better of worse. Where an outsider may see a Never Never Land were you earn a living with your drawings, an insider sees an overcrowded, competitive place, polluted by people with no respect for the craft looking for easy cash.

What are your feelings about the term “conceptual illustration”?

It was all the rage some years ago; I thought it was fit to describe those works where the technical issues were overlooked to focus on expressing some original ideas. Nowadays even the ideas are overlooked and standardized, so it has become an umbrella term for downloading Procreate and spending your time on Instagram I guess.

[timperi-fan]

The next chapter of "If Love Is The Answer, You're Home" is slowly but surely coming along. It went through quite a few rewrites and scraped ideas, but it's about ¾ of the way done now and it's going to probably be about 5k words.

For now, here's a snippet for y'all to get hyped!

“Shit, shit, shit!” Timmy muttered as he hurriedly shoved dirty clothes under throw pillows. 

Tonight was his first date with Peri, and he didn’t exactly want the other man to see how he lived. It’s not like Timmy was planning to invite Peri in — he didn’t have a chance of getting that lucky tonight — so as long as the filth and grime was out of sight, Timmy figured it would be fine.

Once the dirty laundry was properly out of sight, Timmy moved on to the stacks of papers on his coffee table. He scooped them into his arms haphazardly, causing half of them to spill onto the floor. Timmy sighed and bent down to collect the wrinkled papers. It was quick work until he noticed how many of them were bills... And how many more of them were job rejection letters. And how most of them were about his failed comic pitches. 

His kitchen counter was clear, surprisingly, so he decided to stash his tower of rejection there for the night. Like most everything else, Timmy would deal with that tomorrow.

Tonight was about Peri.

“When was the last time I had a date?” Timmy chuckled and leaned against the sink. “Like, a real date?” He stopped, noting how high the stack of dishes in the sink had gotten. “Speaking of last times…” Timmy murmured, running a hand through his hair. 

The rest of his apartment was no better. Timmy had to admit it, he was a bit of a slob. That had always been the case. From the ages of about eleven to eighteen, however, he had… something that motivated him to clean up after himself. Not that he could remember what it was. 

He shook his head to clear his thoughts. “I’ll… I’ll clean the place this week! No problem-o! I’m just a little behind on my spring-cleaning, that’s all.” Timmy tried to reassure himself, but a nagging feeling of guilt tugged at his mind. He tapped his fingers against the counter top. “Maybe I’ll download one of those—” He scratched his head, trying to think of the word. “…Organizer apps. That might help.” Timmy took a deep breath and let his head fall back. “It’s gonna be okay, Turner. You’ve got a date with the hottest, funniest, nicest guy on the planet. Things are already starting to look up,” he reassured himself. 

And speak of the devil, no sooner had he lapsed back into silence than Timmy heard a knock on his front door. A grin inched its way across his face. 

He practically skipped over to the front door. Out of habit, Timmy peered through the peephole. Seeing Peri standing there on his doorstep made his heart soar. 

There was a mirror hanging over the little table where Timmy kept his keys and his wallet. He gazed at his reflection, appraising his appearance. His hair was suitably messy, his sweater wasn't stained, and his grin was anxious, but also excited. Timmy was so, so excited.

He rolled his neck and shook out his limbs. “Let’s do this,” he muttered, and Timmy opened the door.