Finding You: The Complete Box Set (a contemporary MM romance series)

by Ana Ashley

  “I wonder who this guy Vítor is,” David said.

  “Yeah. Do you think he’s of any significance to your mom?” I asked.

  David looked out to the view in front of us like he was trying to remember something.

  “Not sure, really. It’s strange thinking about her with a boyfriend because I never saw her with anyone all my life. I hadn’t even thought about it until now. She must have been lonely. I wonder why she never dated.”

  I thought the same thing. I remembered Paula was very beautiful. She’d had long dark hair and smiling brown eyes. There was so much of her in David. I wasn’t sure he realized that.

  “Wasn’t there another entry that mentions Vítor and your mom?” I took the book from David and started leafing through the pages. When we came on the road trip, we’d read the destinations of the school trips but had decided on reading the content once we were on location, but I thought I’d seen Vítor mentioned elsewhere.

  “Here, this one.” I pointed to another one of the girls’ on-page dialogue that had stood out because it wasn’t a regular entry. It looked like maybe they’d been in class when they wrote on this page.

  David scooted closer to me to read.

  Paula - I really like Vítor.

  Sílvia - I know. You two are so in love it makes me sick!

  Paula - I don’t think he likes me.

  Sílvia - What?? Don’t be silly. Of course he does. Has he done something?

  Paula - No

  Sílvia - Then why?

  Paula - I just have a feeling he’s got a secret that he’s not telling me.

  Sílvia - You think he likes another girl?

  Paula - No, I think it’s something else, something bigger.

  Sílvia - Talk to him.

  Paula - Okay. I’m baking an apple cake today. Wanna help?

  Sílvia - You know I’m your official taste tester and spoon licker. I’ll be there.

  “This is intriguing,” David said. “It looks like this Vítor might have been her high school love interest. Maybe there are more clues later in the journal.”

  We put the journal in the rucksack and walked back to the car. Our next stop was Óbidos where we would stay the night.

  David drove this time, so I took the opportunity to call my grandparents to check in. I was glad to hear they were all well and told my grandmother about some of the places we visited, especially the beautiful fields of the Alentejo, although I left out the part where we’d slept in the car a couple of nights before. I didn’t want to worry her.

  “You will have to try ginjinha,” my grandmother said. “It’s a sour cherry liqueur very traditional in Óbidos. In some places, they serve it in little chocolate cups. One day, I’ll tell you the story of when your granddad got drunk on ginjinha.” She laughed.

  I couldn’t believe how easy it was to feel close to my grandparents after all these years. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say I hadn’t stayed away at all. Yes, I’d talked to them on the phone at least every month and more often when I’d been at my parents’, but it was different.

  I felt warmth in my heart after talking to my grandmother, and happiness. A different kind than the one I felt when I was near David.

  We also called Teresa to check how things were at the café. Because David was driving, we put her on speakerphone. She was such a lovely woman, full of energy, and I could hear in her voice how much she loved David.

  I wondered if David knew that or if he was so caught up in his secret that he didn’t see what was right in front of him. I had a strong feeling that despite Mário’s beliefs, Teresa wouldn’t care about who or what David was, other than a son to her. But it wasn’t my place to tell him that. He would need to know it in his heart first.

  Óbidos was similar to Santarém in the way that as we were approaching it from the highway, we could see the village high up on the hill surrounded by the castle wall. The difference was in the surroundings. While Santarém was a district capital developed beyond the castle walls, Óbidos was a more traditional settlement. It had expanded beyond the walls, but it still kept the quaint small-village buildings.

  After our adventure a couple of nights ago, we decided to find our accommodation before exploring the area. We were staying in the annex of a family-owned house; a cozy one-bedroom-and-living-room conversion with whitewashed walls and dark wood furniture. It looked traditional and lived in.

  Once we had the keys to our accommodation, we asked our host what the best options to explore the historical center were. It turned out that we were only a twenty-minute walk uphill from the main entry gate, so we decided to leave the car and explore on foot.

  The place was heaving with tourists and school trips, and most of them seemed to be interested in the small artisanal shops selling handmade products that lined both sides of the small cobbled streets. Some shops had displays of embroidered tablecloths, tea towels, and aprons hanging on the door due to having limited space inside, while other shops sold all the traditional hand-painted crockery in bright colors.

  We walked the shops and then turned down a quieter street that had a promising sign for a tavern restaurant. A couple of turns later we found it. The seating space outside was on a raised deck with tables and benches, each on a swinging platform.

  We took a seat and ordered a few snacks and a couple of beers since neither of us would be driving again today.

  “What a cool feature,” I said, putting my foot on the platform to make us swing. There were no other tourists or noises around, so it felt like we were in a little oasis. There was even a small breeze.

  “This is perfect,” David said, holding my hand and running his thumb in circles over my knuckles.

  His touch was so soothing. I took a swig of my beer and closed my eyes for a second, just taking in the scent of the flowers that were hanging from the wooden beams above us, giving us some shade.

  I opened my eyes and looked at David. He looked so relaxed and happy. The way he was smiling at me was doing all sorts of things to my heart. I smiled back, not daring to open my mouth for fear I’d say the words that were starting to fight to get out.

  After lunch, we walked all the way around the top of the wall of the castle. The views were beautiful, but from the height of the walls, I preferred looking at all the houses contained within. I wondered how long they’d been there. Had they been passed on from generation to generation? Had they been destroyed and rebuilt as wars were fought and time went by?

  Some of the gardens I could see from above had orange and lemon trees or a small chicken coop. Others were completely paved and only had some outdoor furniture. I was so distracted that I didn’t realize we’d come to the end of the wall and had to turn to go down the stairs.

  As I turned, David pushed me against the wall, and while holding me in place with his own body, his lips crashed on mine. I put my hands around his waist, and as we continued to kiss, I felt my body relax against his. Before my brain noticed he was kissing me openly in daylight, he stopped, and resting his forehead against mine, he said breathlessly, “I’ve been dying to do that.”

  When David grabbed my hand to go down the stairs, I saw a few other tourists smiling at us, clearly having seen the obvious display of affection. David looked back and winked. He knew those people were behind us. And he still kissed me. Fuck.

  We were engulfed by a group of school teenagers as soon as we turned a corner. All we could do was lean against a wall while the group moved on animatedly. David held my hand as we stood side by side, and as the kids were walking past, he squeezed it and whispered to me.

  “Look.” He nodded in the direction of a boy and girl who were holding hands as they walked. The girl was chatting with another girl who was walking beside her. I looked at David not understanding what it was he wanted me to see.

  “Now look at that boy over there.” There was another boy walking almost outside of the group, wearing a yellow T-shirt, keeping his head down with headphones on his ears. He lo
oked like all the other kids, but there was a different stance to him like he was wearing a shield or some sort of invisible armor.

  “Look back at the boy who’s with the girl.”

  That’s when I noticed it. The boy who was with the girl had his eyes locked on the yellow T-shirt boy. With his headphones on and his gaze fixed on the floor, he had no idea he was the object of the other boy’s attention.

  We kept our eyes on the group until they turned another corner and were out of sight.

  “I was that boy,” David said. “The one with the girl.”

  “You liked another boy when you were in high school?”

  “No, but I pretended to like girls while I was trying to figure out why my eyes kept fixing on the boys,” he confessed.

  “It must have been confusing for you.”

  “It was, at least until the summer,” he said.

  “The summer?”

  “The summer we kissed, and the last time I saw you.”

  “Oh.”

  “After that, I knew.”

  19

  David

  I can’t remember the last time I’d had so much fun.

  After exploring the historical part of Óbidos, we’d looked for a shop where we could get a few souvenirs because Joel wanted to buy his granddad a bottle of ginjinha.

  We’d found this tiny shop that sold ginjinha exclusively from Óbidos. The shop was manned by the grandson of the owner, a young guy named Carlos who was in his mid-twenties.

  Carlos talked passionately about the sour cherry liqueur and gave us some to try in the traditionally small chocolate cups. Joel loved it and cheekily asked for a second serving. After many questions and five ginjinhas later, we left the little shop with three bottles and felt just a little warm inside from the alcohol.

  Afterward, we’d found a nice restaurant where we had dinner and then decided to have a quiet night in. Or so I thought. In fact, after finding a deck of cards in a drawer, Joel decided we should play a game neither of us had played since we were kids called fishy.

  It was a simple game where we had to request cards from our opponent until we had all four suits for each rank. In the end, the one with the most complete ranks won the game. The twist in our game was that each time we completed a rank, we had to take a swig of ginjinha, and in each game, the loser lost an item of clothing.

  It didn’t take us long to get drunk on the strong liqueur. I can’t remember who won because, at some point, we gave up on the game and just got naked instead.

  We were too drunk to have any kind of sex but not enough to suddenly find every single part of our bodies funny.

  “You have a tiny heart,” Joel had said, pointing at my chest, his words a little slurry.

  “No, I don’t,” I’d said in outrage.

  “Yes, you do. Look.” He pointed at the tiny mole on my chest and looked closer, his nose nearly touching me and his breath tickling my chest hair.

  “Oh! Now there’s two of them!” he exclaimed.

  This carried on until we eventually made it to bed and fell asleep all tangled up in each other.

  Of course, seven hours later, I couldn’t quite see why yesterday had been so much fun when my head was pounding and I felt like I could be sick at any moment.

  “Stop moving so loud,” Joel groaned.

  “Ugh, I’m not moving. You’re moving.”

  “Shit. We drank too much last night. I haven’t had a hangover like this since I was in college.”

  “Shh,” I whispered and put my arm around him to pull him closer to me. Even with my eyes closed, my mouth found his for a soft kiss.

  Our host had left us with a carton of orange juice in the fridge, which we downed as soon as we were well enough to be vertical. Once we had a shower, we checked out of the accommodation and went in search of a café where we could have some breakfast.

  It was midmorning by the time we arrived in Ericeira, a fisherman’s village on the coast. The area was known for its surfing waves and seafood, but first and foremost, we were interested in just lying on the beach soaking up the sun.

  On our way, we’d stopped at a supermarket and bought some ice for the cooler, soda cans, and some food. Our moms had come to Ericeira in their late teens on a beach day out with some friends, and that’s what we were doing, enjoying a beach day before going back home.

  I had mixed feelings about going home. Despite the hangover, I couldn’t remember when I had felt this happy, and I knew Joel was the sole reason for it. I would have carried on traveling with him, having fun, enjoying his company, and for once, acting my age, but reality was going to come crashing in soon, and I’d need to be prepared for it.

  Still, right now I was far too happy to worry about real life. We were both lying on our beach towels side by side. We’d remembered to bring a beach umbrella, so our food would remain in the shade while we were in the sun, enjoying it before it became too hot.

  Joel was lying on his stomach, his arms supporting his head, facing me. The curve of his body was so inviting, all I wanted to do was run my tongue over it from the back of his knees, then up his butt and back.

  “Stop looking at me like I’m a meal,” he said, squinting from the sunlight with one eye open and the other closed.

  “What can I say? You’d make a fine meal.”

  I scooted over to his towel.

  “Hey! Who said you’re allowed on my towel? This is private property—ouch!” he squeaked after I slapped his butt.

  I lay on my side and rested my head on my elbow. Joel did the same, mirroring my position.

  “You okay?” he asked, changing his tone from playful to one of concern.

  “I am more than okay,” I admitted. “I’ve had a great time over the past few days, and I don’t want it to end.”

  “Me either, but we don’t have to stop seeing each other when we go back, do we?” His voice rose from concern to panic.

  I put a hand on his face and let my thumb trace his cheek, his jaw, his lips. “No, we don’t,” I whispered. He relaxed under my touch and smiled. I leaned over and kissed him. His lips were smooth and warm and so fucking delicious.

  “Mmm... shall we go play in the water to cool down?” I asked.

  “Give me a sec.”

  “Why? Oh!” I smirked at his predicament and turned to sit up, facing the ocean.

  Even though it was a weekday, there were still a lot of people on the beach. No doubt many were tourists from other countries coming to Portugal to enjoy the warm weather and sunshine.

  I’d never been outside of Portugal. With losing my mom and then dedicating my time to the business, I’d never had the chance to go abroad.

  I remembered a time when going abroad was all mom and I talked about. She encouraged me to practice my craft and apply for scholarships that would allow us to afford my studying in Paris or London. She’d worked so hard to save the money to help in case I didn’t get one.

  In the early days after she died, I felt guilty that she worked so hard for me and didn’t even get to enjoy her life. After a while, my energy had shifted toward making the café a success.

  Lost in my own thoughts, I didn’t even notice Joel sitting up next to me until he had his arm around my waist and leaned his head on my shoulder. I turned my head and kissed him.

  “You were somewhere else just now,” he said.

  “Yeah, I was thinking about mom. How she’d worked so hard and didn’t have enough time to enjoy it all before she died.”

  Joel was quiet for a bit and then he asked, “Do you ever wonder about your dad?”

  That was an unexpected question, and I could only reply honestly.

  “Yes.” I got up and held my hand to Joel to pull him up.

  We walked toward the water, and I put an arm around his waist, making the most of our small height difference.

  “When I was ten, I think, I asked her about my dad. She told me that he was a very nice man.”

  “That’s it?” he asked.


  “Yeah, that’s all she said at the time. A few years later, I decided to ask for more information. I’d been watching these shows on TV about DNA and genealogy, and I was curious about where I came from. I was happy with my mom and wouldn’t change our life for the world, but I was curious, you know?”

  “Yeah, I get that. So what happened? Did you ask?”

  “No. I never got the chance. The day I was going to ask, she came home, sat me down, and told me she had cancer. Suddenly, I didn’t care about anything else. All I wanted was to help my mom get better.”

  “But she never did.” It was a statement rather than a question.

  “No.”

  We walked along the beach for a while with our feet occasionally catching the waves.

  “What about now?” Joel asked.

  “I don’t know. I’d like to know who he is, where he is, and if he’s alive. But I don’t know where to start looking.”

  Thinking about my mom was always both good and sad in equal measure. I liked talking about her because it kept her memory alive, but it also made me miss her.

  Thinking about my dad was different. Sometimes you’re afraid of going down a particular road because you’re unsure of what you may find there. You can be excited at the prospect of finding nice buildings, some shops, interesting people, but you may also find it to be derelict, filled with trash and bad people. The thing is, you don’t know unless you take the turn and find out. And that’s where I was, in a constant battle of wills between going down that road and staying put.

  “How about we get back to our spot? I could do with a cold drink,” Joel said.

  “Best idea you’ve had all day,” I said, smiling at him.

  “Oh, it isn’t. It’s just the best one I said out loud.”

  We spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach. We weren’t in a rush to go back home early since I still had a few days off work, so we decided to have dinner at a local restaurant that was well known for its fresh seafood and great service.