by Laura Stone
“And Seth, I have to come clean. If given the chance, I’d wrassle you to the ground with my legs for a chance at him, I would.”
Seth laughed loudly and sharply, completely caught off guard.
She sat back in the chair, looking pleased with herself. “So with all of our late-night confessions out in the open, making us all nothing but the very best of friends, allow me to give you a bit of advice without actually being a wonk and telling you what to do.”
Oliver and Seth shared an “uh oh” look and turned back to her.
“A pair of gorgeous idjits, the both of you.” She sighed and leaned forward, her hands on her knees and a sweet smile on her face that made her look older and wiser than her twenty-five years. “Sure and I’m Catholic,” she rolled her eyes and crossed herself, “but I know this in my gut: This is it, this life. You make the most of what you have, because you just never know. Life isn’t measured by the number of breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away. Don’t forget to leave room for that, my doves.”
She gave Oliver’s knee a squeeze and Seth a cheerless wink. After sitting back and watching them for a moment, she tilted her head and said, “Boys, you’re terrible company tonight. Go on with you and get someplace quiet, and leave me to checking out the talent here before I call the night a waste.” She smiled at Oliver to show that she wasn’t angry in the slightest and rose to her feet.
“Seth? Lovely to meet you.” The boys broke apart to get up and hug her goodbye. She gave Seth a tight squeeze while Seth looked over her head at Oliver, befuddled and bemused, and then hugged Oliver. She got up on tiptoe to get close to his ear and whispered fiercely, “Wise up, you gack! He’s struck dumb with love for you, and a blind man could see you feel the same. You should find a way to make it work, lad.”
She pulled back and held his face in her hands, clucking her tongue sadly. “Give us a kiss and off with you, then.”
Oliver chuckled a sad laugh and obliged, kissing her cheek, but the laugh turned into a genuine sound of amusement when she made an angry noise at not getting a proper kiss. She shoved him at Seth, shaking her head and walked off to the bar, laughing. Toward a group of moderately attractive guys, he noted.
“I bet if scientists studied her for a year, we could solve the world’s energy problem,” Seth mused.
Oliver took a moment to just look at Seth. His clothes and hair were perfect, of course, but that wasn’t what Oliver wanted to brand on his memory. It was the way the far-off look in Seth’s eyes as he watched Moira walk away changed into something intimate and charged, something that left him feeling slightly breathless as Seth’s heated gaze drifted back to him. That Seth could still look at him as if he wanted everything Oliver was and could be warmed him to his core and reminded him that he shouldn’t even think of giving up on this chance they had.
Moira was right. He was stupidly, completely and woefully in love with the man. It could be argued that this made their unsolved problem worse, but it was true. Oliver loved everything about him: his proud and determined spirit; his long, lean frame; his graceful movements; the tilt of his head as he thought; the smile at the corner of his mouth when he was amused. The way he kept himself back to keep from being hurt, because when he let himself relax—when he let himself relax with Oliver—it was a gift. It was Seth trusting him, and Seth didn’t trust just anyone.
“Ready to go home?”
Seth sighed around a smile. “No. I still have a week, remember?”
It was a painful but necessary reminder that this would never be Seth’s home. Oliver’s breathing went shallow; it hurt too much to breathe deeply and force his lungs to press against his aching heart. “Ready to come back to my current home with me, then?”
“You had me at current.” Seth slipped his arm in Oliver’s and allowed himself to be led outside.
Oliver didn’t have a response, but he gathered that Seth knew that. They walked out together to hail a cab, not speaking except for Oliver giving directions to the cabbie. Seth held Oliver against him for the short ride back, and with his cheek pressed against Seth’s, their hands woven together, Oliver allowed himself to simply appreciate the moment. His worry over the unknown was like acid eating away at him, and he wanted something to just feel right as the day came to a close.
After paying the fare and quietly entering the house—Janos had practice early in the morning—Oliver closed the door to his bedroom and reached out for Seth’s hand.
“Can I just… can we just hold each other tonight? I’m not asking for you to do anything more. I just want—I just want to hold you.” He felt desperate and needy, but he also thought Seth might not refuse him, not after the overtures Seth had made to him all night.
With a shy smile, Seth answered, “Please.”
Oliver swung their hands between their bodies and smiled. “I’ll meet you in bed?”
Something painful moved behind Seth’s eyes; Oliver was aware of his own throat constricting. “Deal.”
He made quick work of changing into something comfortable to sleep in and brushed his teeth in Janos’s bathroom. He slipped into the cool sheets of his bed, arms crossed behind his head, and waited for Seth.
He knew that this was what he wanted; he wanted every night to end this way, with Seth climbing into his bed. He wanted to wake up every day with Seth at his side. He wanted to come home and have holidays and Saturday trips to the market and Sunday brunch in bed and all of it with Seth. He still held the belief that even if he stayed in England, it would just be a few years apart and then sixty or more together. It was foolish, given how Seth thought about his own ability to endure a long separation, but he just couldn’t see a future that didn’t have Seth in it.
Stepping out of the small bathroom, Seth shut off the light and quietly made his way back to the bed. Oliver flipped down the blankets and patted the mattress. Seth sat on the edge of the bed, staring down at his hands.
“You okay?”
Seth kicked off his slippers, slipped into bed and wrapped his arms around Oliver’s sides, burying his face in Oliver’s neck. Oliver pulled the blankets up to cover them, wrapped Seth up in his arms and drew warm, soothing patterns on his skin.
“When did it all get so hard?” Seth asked, his breath hot and ticklish against Oliver’s neck.
Oliver looked at the ceiling, his throat working to swallow the bitterness of not having an answer.
Seth curled in tighter and tangled their legs together. “Tomorrow. That’s when we look at flights, okay?”
Oliver buried a hand in Seth’s hair, grateful that, for all of his dumb mistakes, for all the ways their lives hadn’t gone the way they’d dreamed, Seth was still willing to try. “Yes.”
They held each other there in the dark. As sleep began to pull at Oliver, he kissed Seth’s forehead and whispered against his skin, “I love you.” It was how he’d imagined every night ending before reality had pulled the two of them apart.
Seth kissed his shoulder and, his voice endearingly earnest, he whispered back, “I love you, too.”
This is how every night is supposed to end, Oliver thought, as a few tears slipped down his face.
Chapter Seventeen
Oliver slowly rose to consciousness the next morning, a gradual awareness. And he was aware that he was warm and tangled up. He blinked his eyes open to see blue silk—Seth’s pajamas. They must have switched positions in the night; Oliver was laying sprawled across Seth’s torso while Seth worked his fingers through his messy hair, lightly scratching his scalp. He murmured quiet happy noises and buried his face under Seth’s chin, squeezing tight when Seth laughed.
“That feels good,” Oliver moaned, curling his shoulders in and flexing his feet. “Have you been awake a long time?”
“No, just a few minutes. I started to get out of bed, and you launched yourself at me. Pretty impressive given you were still snoring.”
Oliver pushed up on his hands. “I don’t snore!”
&
nbsp; Seth barely held back his smile. “No, you don’t, I’m just teasing. You do smack your lips and mutter, though.” He ran the flat of his hand over Oliver’s hair, pushing it off his forehead. “It’s pretty cute.”
Oliver blushed, groaned and smiled all at once, and he pressed his face back into Seth’s neck. The tiny vibrations from Seth’s laughing throat sent shivers down Oliver’s body. It was a pretty terrific way to wake up.
“As much as I enjoy your human blanket, I really need to use the facilities.”
Oliver laughed and rolled off him, starfishing in the bed as Seth stood. “Sorry about that.”
“I said I enjoyed it, Oliver,” Seth replied, smiling back at him as he shut the bathroom door.
This was a big day, Oliver knew. He might not be able to give either school a definitive answer today, but he and Seth could plan his trip to New York, and then he could let Dr. Jones know when to expect him.
And he needed to make sure Seth understood that, while this decision was important, he was too. Oliver was beginning to realize that Seth had held back not just because of the potential of being hurt, but because he saw this as an either-or situation. That was the only way Seth could see it. Cambridge or Seth, not New York and Seth or Cambridge and Seth in a few years.
Which was exactly how Oliver had seen it: He could have his Seth and academics too, even if it involved a long wait. “Ever the optimist,” Seth had called him, and it was true. He’d been blinding himself to the reality that he wouldn’t always be able to make things work. That the compromises that he’d come up with weren’t always acceptable to others, no matter how willing Oliver himself was to bend for them.
A few years ago, fresh from the heartbreak with Seth, and this decision would have been easy. Love; always choose love. But he’d lived enough life and come to enough realizations about his parents’ relationship and about himself to know that being miserable with a career or from taking the wrong path could be destructive to a partner. Regret—he never wanted to live with regret. Mistakes could be remedied, but whole-life changes weren’t the same thing.
Seth—who had lost a parent, almost lost the other and was forced into an adult role far too early—had realized this a long time ago. With a sickening feeling of shame, Oliver finally understood how cruel it had been, for these past few months, to entertain the idea that it would be okay, no matter what, and just expect Seth to go along with either decision. Oliver was a bit of a people-pleaser, though he didn’t think of it as a negative characteristic, as he knew others did; and he finally got just how arrogant it was to have thought Seth would be willing to be dragged along in the hopes that possibly one day Oliver could make him happy.
He ran the flat of his hand over the still-warm pillow on Seth’s side of the bed. Seth was even more remarkable than Oliver had given him credit for. He was still the boy who would patiently wait for Oliver to choose him over his own fear, patiently wait even as his own heart was aching. He had become the man who would put that same aching heart on the line for a chance to be with Oliver again.
It was beyond humbling. Oliver covered his face with both hands and let himself feel the shame—he deserved it. He finally understood what Seth had meant all those years ago: Oliver was always making Seth wait. It had taken him forever to recognize how amazing Seth was when they were teenagers, and that being in love openly was better than hiding from his father and being miserable. While Seth was struggling with his first year in New York, waiting for Oliver to come, Oliver had been comfortable at home as he took his time with his decision about Brandeis, and then taking even longer to bother to tell Seth about it.
And now Seth was in his house, in England for crying out loud, waiting once again to see if Oliver would make him a priority.
He had never felt lower or angrier with himself than he did in that moment; he wanted desperately to tell Seth that they would be together from that moment on, and he knew that he couldn’t say that.
Seth was definitely the more realistic man in their relationship, but Oliver would gladly spend the rest of his life making up for his own lack of foresight if given the chance.
After a moment of wallowing, he got to his feet and pulled an outfit out of the wardrobe. Today would be all for Seth. Oliver would do just about anything to show him how grateful he was for the chance to love Seth as he deserved.
* * *
Oliver wouldn’t let Seth get on his laptop after they’d had coffee and pastries. Janos had brought some back after his first morning practice, telling Seth to “Eat, eat!” and making an assured thumbs-up at him. Seth was reaching for his fourth and trying to snake Oliver’s laptop off his legs at the same time.
“No,” Oliver laughed, twisting away and taking his computer with him. “You just want to look up reviews for David’s performances.”
Seth grumbled and shoved a bite into his mouth.
“We decided that Saturday would be our day of joyful mocking at how he flopped, and I’m sticking to that plan,” Oliver said.
“We might be looking up notices for auditions instead of mocking, you know.”
Oliver took the last pastry out of the paper box, tore it in half—well, sixty-forty—and gave the larger piece to Seth as a consolation. “Now let me check flight seating.”
Seth gave him a look and shoved the whole thing in his mouth, crossing his arms and working his toes under Oliver’s leg on the sofa. “Is this place ever warm? I didn’t think I’d need to pack toe warmers.”
Oliver laughed and scrolled through the screen to see all of the available seats on Seth’s flight. Then he pulled up his email and began typing a response to Maeve Jones, letting her know that he would be available to fly to the States on the upcoming Monday, arriving in the early evening, if that was acceptable.
“I’m going to go ahead and book it, I think. There are only a few seats left on your flight. Is that okay?”
Seth wrapped his arms around his knees and smiled at him. “Very.”
Oliver exhaled, feeling energized at the idea of going back to New York together and getting closer to making an informed decision. “So, let’s see…” Oliver checked his watch and did a little math. “It’s not quite six o’clock in New York, so we have a few hours to kill before I get a response.” Oliver set his laptop on the coffee table and stretched his arms high overhead, arching his back. “Any ideas?”
Seth coughed, turning away; he’d been staring at Oliver.
“What?” Oliver asked, tugging his shirt down.
Seth shook his head and smiled.
“Whaaat?” Oliver asked, nudging Seth’s leg.
“Nothing,” Seth said, turning his head away to laugh softly. He cleared his throat and turned back, the color high in his cheeks. “So! A few hours to kill?” He thought for a moment before getting excited and asking, “Could we do one of those flat-bottomed canoe tours?”
“Only if you asked the rental desk for a flat-bottomed canoe,” Oliver teased. “Want to make it a full-fledged picnic?”
Seth brightened and squeezed Oliver’s forearm. “Can we?”
“Of course; whatever you’d like. But the important question is this: Hire a student, or try to do it ourselves?”
“Oh.” Seth seemed to take this very seriously, resting his arm on the back of the sofa and thinking. It was adorable. It was just punting; plus, the tourist season hadn’t really started, so there weren’t many people expected on the water, especially not on a weekday.
“I have absolutely no idea how to drive one of those things,” Seth said, tapping his chin. “Do you?” He looked expectantly at Oliver.
“I’ve done it a couple of times. I mean, I’m no expert, but I think I can manage to not bang into anyone else.”
A slow, saucy smile spread on Seth’s face. “Will you wear a striped shirt and a straw boater? Sing me songs in Italian?”
Oliver laughed at that. “One, those are gondolas, not punts, and two, I’m pretty sure that I’ve never owned a straw boater.”
“Party pooper. Can we bring a blanket and a picnic basket? Oh.” Seth leaned forward and placed his hand on Oliver’s forearm, concerned. “Do you have a picnic basket?”
“Sadly, no. But the place we’ll rent the boat from has a ready-to-go picnic. I assume you want the full English experience?” Seth nodded, beaming from ear to ear. Oliver was feeling better about things just watching Seth’s growing excitement.
“Of course!”
“Okay, then. Will you trust me?”
Seth stretched his legs out, hopped to his feet and held a hand out to Oliver to pull him up. “That sounds like the start of every wacky rom-com adventure movie ever.”
“I promise,” Oliver laughed, “there will be no kidnappings by dimwitted pirates, no secret agents planting microfilm on us, and no getting swept up in a failed jewel heist.”
“Too bad about that last one.”
Oliver graciously offered Seth first dibs on the shower. He used that time to call Granta Moorings and make sure that they would be able to get “The English Hamper;” Seth was going to get the full UK experience, with Pimm’s and a few other key items.
“Thank you very much,” Oliver told the clerk, and hung up. He whistled under his breath as he dug around the bottom of his wardrobe for his well-worn boat shoes, grinning in anticipation of a great day.
* * *
Having hired the punt and gotten the blanket and cushions situated just so inside the boat, Oliver knelt down and began rolling up his pant legs.
“Are you planning on getting wet?” Seth asked, twisting from the bottom of the boat as Oliver stepped off the dock and onto the boat’s stern. He grabbed the pole and grinned down at Seth.
“Hush, it’s tradition.”
“Mm,” Seth hummed, but Oliver could see him smiling.
“Plus, I happen to have it on good authority that you like my ankles.”
“Slanderous lies.” Looking ahead, Seth crossed his leg over his knee, smoothing the tan linen and bouncing his foot, which was stylishly sheathed in a bicolored Oxford.
“Seriously, though,” Oliver said cautiously.