by Max Hudson
Derek nodded. “Yeah,” he replied. “You just got out of the hospital and you didn’t look too well when I last saw you.”
Luca shook his head, licking his lower lip. He didn’t want to hear about this. At least not right then. “I was just confused.”
Derek nodded once more, his gaze trained right on Luca’s eyes. “Are you still confused?”
Luca shut his eyes, wondering about Las Vegas. Beth hadn’t had a chance to tell him anything about what had happened, and now, he wished that she had. He still couldn't remember it, it was all still a big blank, and he hated that it would probably affect the way that he felt about Derek.
“I’m not confused,” Luca said. “I’m… there are some blanks, but the doctors said that they will come back eventually. They said it was probably from the shock. Not real amnesia, because apparently that is super rare.”
“What do you mean? What is it, then?” Derek said, cocking his head. Luca hated how interested he looked. This wasn’t the way that he had looked at all when they had been talking in the hospital, when Luca had needed Derek to tell him that they were still together.
It hadn’t been like that at all. Derek was only there because he felt sorry for Luca. He wasn’t sure why Derek was there now and he wasn’t sure if he should be honest with him. He supposed he didn’t have anything to lose, and plus, he thought that being honest would probably be the easiest way to get rid of Derek.
“I don’t know,” he said. “You know, they said it was something about my brain trying to defend itself. You know how your body has a fever when you have an infection because your white blood cells are trying to stop things from getting worse?”
“I guess?”
“So… that’s what I mean,” he said. “The psychiatrist said that my mind was just trying to protect itself from other stressful things, since, you know, I was already so stressed out. My mind is in survival mode.”
Derek nodded, looking down at the ground. Luca noticed that his hands had been made into fists at his side. “So you’ll remember everything soon?”
“I should,” Luca replied. “Once things calm down for me.”
Derek sighed deeply, making his entire body shrug when he did so. “Yeah, that makes sense.”
“Anyway,” Luca said, looking back into his apartment and wondering how much of this conversation Brooklyn was overhearing. “I should really get back to—”
“Luca, wait,” Derek said.
Luca had already half turned, but he cocked his head back to see Derek. He raised his eyebrows. “What is it?”
“Could we have dinner soon?”
“You want to have dinner?”
“I just think it might be good,” Derek said. “What happened in Vegas… There was a lot of baggage surrounding that. You need to know the truth and I want you to hear it from me. I am, after all, the source.”
Luca squinted. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought that Derek had just asked him out on a date.
He didn’t know if he wanted to say yes. On one hand, when he had woken up after the accident, Luca truly believed that he was going out with Derek.
When his family had told him that he wasn't, he was surprised and confused, but he wasn't exactly upset. Not about not being with Derek anyway, because not being with him somehow felt right, but it wasn’t aligning with the narrative in his head. That part of it really did feel wrong.
Luca had been upset, but it hadn’t been about Derek. He was upset about the fact that he seemed to be misremembering things.
He didn't think that he missed Derek, not really, but how was he going to be able to tell for sure if he wasn't around him? He had to give himself the chance to miss him. Otherwise, it would have been unfair for everyone involved.
He didn’t want to be unfair. Certainly not to himself. The opportunity had presented itself, and Luca would have been an idiot not to take it. He looked back at his apartment, at the closed door.
Brooklyn was still in there, waiting for him to come back inside. For a second, it felt wrong, almost like a betrayal. Luca didn’t know if saying yes to Derek asking him out was okay when Brooklyn was inside waiting for him.
It wasn’t as if Brooklyn and Luca were dating each other, though. In fact, Luca reminded himself, they weren't anything.
He didn't even think that they would be friends after what Luca had said to him. He would go back into his apartment, apologize, and then they would probably never see each other again. He swallowed and looked up at Derek again, realizing that Derek was his only option.
He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He licked his teeth and continued watching Derek, waiting for him to say something that would convince him he was the better option of the two.
Not that he had a choice, he reminded himself. It wasn’t as if these two men were fighting over him. One was his ex and one was just his good-looking nurse, who had somehow managed to miraculously land in his apartment the night before through a series of very strange events.
Derek raised his eyebrows when he saw Luca furrowing his brow. “Luca?” he asked. “What do you want to do?”
Luca opened his mouth to answer.
“Come on,” Derek said. “It’s not like we’re getting married. We can just have dinner and then we can both go on our way. You never have to think about me again if you don’t want to.”
Luca looked up at him, took a second to think, and then nodded. “Sure,” he said. “As long as it’s just dinner.”
“Yes,” Derek replied. “I promise. Just dinner. Tonight? I’ll pick you up at eight.”
“You’re picking me up?”
“Unless you’re back to driving?”
“No,” Luca said, shaking his head. “Okay. Pick me up.”
“Cool,” Derek said with a smile. “See you then.”
Luca nodded, though he felt a little nauseous. He wasn’t sure why. He watched as Derek turned and started to walk away and back to his car. It wasn’t until Derek was in his little sedan, waving at him, that Luca turned to walk back into his apartment.
Chapter Six
When Luca went back into his apartment, he didn’t see Brooklyn in the kitchen. His apartment wasn't big, so it was a little disorienting when he couldn't spot Brooklyn instantly. That, and walking was slightly painful. Luca wanted to sit down, but before he could do that, he needed to address what had happened. “Brooklyn?”
“In the living room,” came the instant reply.
Luca bit his lips. The way he had said that, so casually, Luca thought that he could get used to that. He didn’t want to overthink it too much, but he liked the way that Brooklyn’s voice sounded in his head much better than the way Derek’s voice did, and for a second, all he could feel was regret that he had spent all that time outside with Derek instead of inside, talking to Brooklyn.
Or simply spending time around Brooklyn, that would have been okay too.
He leaned against the wall when he realized that everything felt slightly wobbly. He hadn’t realized how difficult he was finding it to walk. “Brooklyn, what are you doing?”
“I’m having breakfast,” Brooklyn said. Luca heard him put some cutlery down. “Are you okay?”
Brooklyn stood up and walked toward Luca, who was still leaning against the wall. “Fine,” he said. “Turns out finding your footing is a little bit harder when you’ve just gotten up after an accident. Especially when you had an intense morning.”
“Did you have an intense morning?” Brooklyn said, cocking his head.
Luca looked down at his feet. He didn’t even know where he could start. “To be honest with you, my life is normally pretty… average,” he said. “The last few days have been far too interesting for my taste.”
“Yeah,” Brooklyn said with a smile. “I tend to have a preference for the mundane too. Did you deal with the person at the door?”
Luca smiled back at him, wondering just how much of what had happened outside Brooklyn had heard. All that he could do was nod shyly.
“Okay,” Brooklyn said. “Then I’m going to go, okay? Your breakfast is in the oven. It’s turned to low and you can just get it out whenever.”
Luca closed his eyes and sighed. “Thank you,” he said. “Seriously. For everything.”
“Yeah, don’t mention it,” he said. “What’s your phone number? I’ll call you so you can have mine.”
“That sounds good,” Luca replied. He rattled off his phone number to Brooklyn, who put it in his phone. Then Brooklyn called him and Luca let his phone vibrate on the counter.
“I should go,” Brooklyn said. “Thank you for inviting me over.”
“It’s no problem.”
“I had fun.”
“Brooklyn,” Luca said when he saw that Brooklyn had started to walk toward the door. Brooklyn turned back to look at him.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“I’m sorry,” Luca replied quietly. “I didn’t… I’m scared. I didn’t mean to take it out on you.”
“It’s okay,” Brooklyn said. He crossed the space between them, put a hand under Luca’s chin and tilted his face up. Luca liked the way that his touch felt on his face, the way that his skin felt on Luca’s face. It was weird how much he liked it, how it sent a shiver down his spine, and how now his face would feel weird and wrong if he wasn’t being touched by Brooklyn.
“Brooklyn…”
Brooklyn looked right into his eyes. “Seriously,” he said. “I’m telling you it’s okay. I get it.”
“You do?” Luca said. For the first time, he noticed that his voice was trembling.
“Yes,” Brooklyn replied. “You’re adjusting. It’s normal that you’re lashing out.”
Luca sighed, his entire body moving when he did. “I shouldn’t have reacted like that to you helping me.”
“I get it,” Brooklyn said. “Seriously. Things are going to get easier for you. I promise.”
Luca’s eyes opened and he set his gaze on Brooklyn. “How can you be so sure?”
“Because they got better for me,” Brooklyn said. “They got better for my sister. You strike me as a persevering type, and once you keep going, you’ll get to where you need to be.”
“Which is where?” Luca said. His face was wet. It was the first time that he realized that he was crying since Brooklyn was holding him. Any other time, he would have had the good sense to be embarrassed. But not this time. This transcended any embarrassment that he might feel, and it became something else.
Something bigger, something more important. He wasn’t quite sure how to process it.
“I don’t know,” Brooklyn said with a smile. “But you’ll figure it out.”
“But what if I can’t?”
“You will,” Brooklyn said. He dropped his hand to his side, and for a second, Luca hated that he hadn’t kissed him. That he hadn’t even attempted to kiss him. Luca could have taken the initiative, but he felt very much like he was in Brooklyn’s grip, and part of him felt completely paralyzed when Brooklyn was the one who was in charge.
The weird part of it was that he always wanted Brooklyn to be in charge. Brooklyn felt like the kind of person who really knew what he was talking about, and without realizing it, Luca had come to rely on him to an extent that other people might have considered unreasonable.
It wasn’t as if he even knew him, which made all of this so much weirder.
“When you do,” Brooklyn said. “You should call me.”
Luca blinked. “When I do what?”
“When you do figure it out,” Brooklyn replied.
Luca watched him, trying to keep his mouth from opening widely. If he didn’t know better, that would have sounded like an invitation for a date. But he did know better. There was something about all this that made him feel slightly uneasy and part of him was absolutely positive that he would never, ever call Brooklyn for a date.
Brooklyn would always be out of his league, no matter what. He would always be just out of reach. He was too kind, too gorgeous, too anything to want to go out with Luca. He knew that he would have had a chance with him before the accident, but now he felt broken.
Luca smiled at him, a little sadly, once he realized the truth in his own thoughts. “And you’d say yes?”
“If you don’t take too long,” Brooklyn said, biting his lower lip. “You’re going to want to hurry up, because I have prospects.”
“Yeah,” Luca said. “I don’t doubt it.”
Then he watched Brooklyn walk away from him and out the door, closing it softly behind him and not looking back at him even once. He felt a little strange when he saw Brooklyn leave, like he had just missed a really big opportunity.
But Brooklyn had been right and Luca didn’t want to waste time thinking about what could have happened. Instead, he wanted to take his time to find his footing, just like Brooklyn had said. So that when Luca called him—and he did plan to call him, maybe, if he managed to have the courage to—he was someone worthy of his time and respect, and Luca didn’t feel like someone was taking care of him. He didn’t think that he had seen pity in Brooklyn’s face, but he didn’t think that pity was far off from what he actually felt, and he couldn’t stand the thought of that.
He didn’t want Brooklyn to feel sorry for him. He wanted Brooklyn to like him for him, but right then, he didn’t think that there was anything particularly likable about him. And he needed to know the truth, too. Once he knew the truth, about Derek, about what had happened in Las Vegas, he was sure that he would become a lot more date-able.
For the time being, though, he still needed to get himself there. He sighed, went to the oven, and took his breakfast out. Brooklyn had used all of the ingredients that were available to him to make a quesadilla that was out of this world and Luca smiled gratefully.
Yeah, he needed Brooklyn in his life. It would take a little while, probably, but he was more than willing to make it happen.
Chapter Seven
Luca’s meds were in front of him on the coffee table, and he was feeling a little bit better than he had in the morning. There was something to be said for the way that his medication worked—the problem wasn’t that it didn’t work, the problem was that it worked for a little while and then it stopped working as well. He couldn’t take nearly as much medicine as he wanted to take in order not to be in pain and he couldn’t get used to this as his new normal.
He knew that lots of people lived with chronic pain, but he didn’t want to be one of those people. Up until then, these people with chronic pain were people that he read about online when he was feeling sorry for himself or people who came to the place that he worked at who had started exercising because they wanted to get rid of some sort of ailment or muscular issue.
Luca got it, in theory. The prospect of it, however, seemed to be looming over his own life like a dark cloud and he couldn’t abide it. Up until that point, Luca had always been a shining example of health. When he was a teenage boy—and, he supposed, like all teenage boys—he imagined himself to be immortal and completely unbeatable.
Things were different now that he was an adult. They were different after the accident, in any case. Not just because he had realized that he was definitely not some sort of unbeatable force, but rather because it was the first time in his life that he had to take steps to do certain things, things that he didn’t necessarily want to do but that seemed extremely important.
Luca wasn’t the kind of person that had ever been saddled with dreams. He was happy to do whatever was needed to get done, have a normal job, and try to live a normal life. It was weird to think that was his dream now. Normalcy shouldn’t have been a dream, he thought absent-mindedly as he looked down at his phone.
His first call was going to be to his boss. His boss was an understanding woman who took no shit from anyone. It didn’t hurt that she looked like she could beat anyone up, regardless of how small she was. And she was very small, too, but all of her was made up of muscle and her arms were hard as rocks.
/> This was something that Luca knew for certain, since he had touched her arms before. She made every single person that was around her touch her arms every time she got drunk, and she got drunk every time the office had a party.
She was a great boss, though, and no one minded it too much. According to rumors that Luca had heard, she had started as a model in the business, but then she had decided to have a family so she had moved to one of the sales positions. The company was happy to accommodate her and that was just because she had wanted a change, so he hoped that they would be able to accommodate him.
Still, he didn’t want to talk to her. As understanding as Fallon was, she was still his boss, and he didn’t like the idea of asking her for favors.
Despite that, he knew he was going to have a lot of unpleasant conversations—his conversation with Derek was the first thing that came to mind—so he thought that he might as well pull the trigger.
Sighing, he grabbed his phone and scrolled down until he saw his boss’s name and smiling face in his contacts. He pressed down the button to call her and waited a few seconds for her to answer.
She picked up the phone after the third ring. “Hello? Luca?”
“Hey,” he said. “How are you doing?”
There was a second when she didn’t answer. She was probably deciding how she should answer that question. Luca wasn’t crazy about it.
“I’m fine,” she said. “You know, compared to you. How are you doing?”
Luca laughed quietly. “I’ve been better.”
“I bet. You know, Luca, you don’t have to come back to work until you’re ready.”
“I know,” he said. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, when I go back, I’m worried I’m not going to be able to do everything that you expected me to do beforehand.”
“That’s okay,” she replied. “We can ease you into it.”
Luca took a deep breath before he answered. “That’s what I’m calling about.”
“What do you mean?”