It had only been three days. Honestly, he'd thought it would have been longer before he allowed himself to be homesick, before he yearned for his Mother's bad cooking and his Father's corny jokes. He missed the warmth of home. The petty fights between his parents. The politically incorrect and misogynist jokes his grandfather attempted to make.

The sunburn had peeled and turned into a tan that didn't suit him. His hair, forever unruly, had softened from the salt water and was lightened by the sun. The hives had gone away after he took a double dose of antihistamine. He felt okay, good.

Seth expected a black cloud to hang over his head all the time, but that wasn't how things were at all. It didn't seem right. Everything here was bright and beautiful. Gray clouds didn't dominate the sky and the air was never bitterly cold. Had there been miserable weather, it might have made it feel like what he was doing served a purpose. But everything was normal. Nothing had changed. It hadn't brought Ryan back and it wouldn't; not if he thought about it logically.

Seth spent the rest of the afternoon getting all the things he needed for the boat. When he checked his watch, he was surprised to find that it was almost four o'clock already. At the marina, he found the closest information desk.

"Hi, uh, is Tyler here?" he asked the clerk -a heavyset man chopping on a cigar.

"He's busy," the man grunted.

Seth scratched his neck, a nervous habit. "Oh, okay, no that's...that's cool. It's just...well, he said to come by at four and it's four now, so I figured that-"

"Tyler!" he hollered, cutting Seth off. Apparently it was easier to get Tyler than it was to listen to Seth babble. "Ty!"

"What?" came the muffled reply.

"There's some kid out here for you," the man replied gruffly, taking a puff off his Stogie.

Tyler materialized from the back room. Seth was happy to see a friendly face.

"Hey, Seth!" he said, jumping over the desk and landing a foot away from Seth. "I'm going now, Dad." He chucked his smock at the big man and clapped Seth on the back, leading him away.

"That was your Dad?" Seth asked, somewhat to himself.

"Yeah, he comes across as a mean son-of-a-bitch, but mostly that's just for show; he's a real teddy bear once you get to know him."

Seth looked back and waved bye. Tyler's father blew rings of smoke out of his mouth and grunted. Yeah, he looked really cuddly. Suddenly the image of Smokey the Bear popped into his head and he had to bite his cheek to stop himself from smiling.

Back at the Summer Breeze, it worked out that Seth knew shit about fixing a boat. Swallowing his pride, he agreed to let Tyler do all the manual labour while he passed him the tools. He'd never felt like such a girl in his life. Even so, the repairs didn't take too long and Seth felt useful in his own way.

It was just after six when Seth found himself following Tyler to his house for dinner. Tyler lived in a shack. There was no kind way to put it. Seth was almost afraid to step in, afraid he'd cut his hand and wind up contracting Tetanus. When was the last time he'd been to the doctor for shots anyway?

Reluctantly, he followed Tyler inside. He was surprised to find that it wasn't too bad, not a million dollar mansion but not a shanty in China either. It was charming, really.

"Hungry?" Tyler asked over his shoulder, shucking his stained work shirt and grabbing a clean one from a basket on the counter.

Seth rubbed his stomach, trying to quell the disruptive noises. "Starved."

"Great," he said and sifted through a drawer pulling out some take-out menus. "Pizza okay?"

"It's fine," Seth answered somewhat distracted. He picked up one of the coupons and laughed. "Hey, this is my mother's recipe!" He laughed to himself when Tyler didn't get the joke. There was nothing like his Mother's 'Home Cooking.'

Tyler phoned in their order while Seth took a seat on the futon against the dominate wall.

On the coffee table sat a bunch of comics. Seth sifted through them. Underneath was a dozen or so drawings. Comic book characters he'd never heard of. The drawing were good, detailed but not yet shaded.

"You like comics?" Tyler hung up the phone and set it back on its cradle. Stepping up to the sink, his picked up a bar of soap and began to lather up his greasy hands. Rivulets of dirty water passed through his fingers and drained into the metallic sink basin.

Seth realized he'd been staring and turned his attention back to the drawings in front of him. "Like them? Comic Con is pretty much the highlight of my year. I've never seen these though, are they Japanese?"

"Those?" He pointed to the drawings with a paper towel as he dried his hands and then discarded it into the trash bin. "No, those are all mine. Just something I do to kill time."

"They're really good," Seth said, looking through them again.

"Really?" he asked, sounding surprised.

"Yeah. You should pursue it; maybe you can be the next Stan Lee or Todd McFarlane or something, I dunno. "

When Seth looked up Tyler's cheeks were slightly pink. "Right. Even if I wanted to... My father hurt his back a couple years ago and my Mom died when I was just a kid... I need to stay close; help out. Keep the marina going."

Seth nodded. "Still, it's a shame to let all this talent go to waste."

Tyler sat down beside Seth, taking the drawings out of his hands. "You really think they're good?"

"Definitely."

Tyler smirked. "Thanks."

Settling back into the couch, Seth could feel Tyler's eyes on him. He felt his own face heat up.

When Tyler spoke his voice was smooth and even, the embarrassment and self-consciousness of a moment ago had vanished. "So why are you here, Seth?"

"You invited me, didn't you?"

He laughed, a light chuckle. "No, I mean why are you here in this place. You said you were from Newport, right?"

"Oh. No, yeah. I just needed to be on my own for awhile. Figure some things out." Seth looked at his shoes instead of making eye contact.

"Is it because of the gay thing?"

Seth's head snapped up so fast, he heard a little popping sound in his neck. A wave of heat trickled down his spine. This could only end badly. Guys like Tyler-with their muscular builds and colour-changing eyes-were the same type that had beaten Seth on the playground in middle school and peed in his shoes in highschool. "What?! What gay thing?"

Tyler's tone was still casual. "You know... You. Being gay. Is that what you needed to figure out?"

"I'm...not. I'm not gay." Or at least he hadn't been until Ryan came along and made him question everything.

"Okay," he said in a tone that let Seth know he was prepared to let the subject drop. Only he didn't, not really. "There's nothing to be ashamed of, I'm not."

The silence stretched.

Seth's eyes crinkled at the corners, he looked at Tyler in all seriousness. "You think I'm gay?"

He shrugged. "Do you think you're gay?"

Why was it that he was starting to feel like he was talking to a shrink? They always did that: answer questions with questions. Seth felt like he was under a microscope, each of his actions being studied and documented.

He scratched the back of his neck, more than a little nervous, and swallowed thickly. "I dunno. I mean, how do I know?"

"My guess is, if you're asking..."

Seth was nodding very slowly, unable to control it as if someone else was guiding his action. His mouth felt very dry and his ears were ringing. "Right. No...well, I didn't really think I was..." Seth took in a breath. A big breath. "Not before Ryan."

"Ryan?"

"He's my brother," Seth answered automatically. He'd gotten used to thinking about Ryan that way...or at least, he'd gotten used to thinking that was how he should think about Ryan. As a brother, nothing more.

Tyler held his hands out in front of him, a look of shock on his handsome face. "Whoa, somehow I didn't see that one coming."

Seth chuckled humourously. "He's not my real brother. Not that it matters one way or the other to him." Suddenly the corner of the coffee table was very interesting.

"And you like him?"

"I didn't think it was a gay thing until he left...I don't know, man. I thought...it doesn't really matter. It's just so hard." Seth peeled a chip of wood from the dented corner of the table before he realized what he'd done and then tried to fit it back into place, giving up when he caused a bigger mess and more splinters to fall onto the shag carpet.

"It's not hard, Seth." Seth looked up questioningly, but Tyler just continued. "I'd imagine pretending all the time would be harder." Tyler looked to Seth for confirmation. "Well, isn't it?" Seth reluctantly nodded. "As soon as you let go of the illusions of what you think it means, whatever bad notions you've had drilled in your head, then you can accept it and move on with your life."

"It's not that easy. It can't be." Seth leaned back, letting his weight fall into the soft cushions behind him. "Has anyone ever told you that you sound like a shrink?"

Tyler smiled crookedly. "I guess I've seen enough of them to start talking like one. The old man made me see one after mom died and I started getting nightmare," Tyler answered in response to Seth's silent question. He shook out his body and slapped Seth's knee. "Hey! You know what? We should get drunk!"

"We should?" Seth questioned, raising his eyebrows.

"Yep, nothing mends-or numbs-a broken heart quite like alcohol."

Pondering that logic over, Seth agreed, "I guess it couldn't hurt." He was just grateful for someone to talk to...and drink with, he supposed. What the hell, it couldn't hurt and even if it didn't help, at least he wouldn't have to think too hard.

Everything was going so well Seth hardly thought about Ryan anymore. The alcohol was a big help with that. Ryan was just some guy that he had once known. He didn't care about him anymore.

At all...

Okay, so that was a big fat lie, but it helped get him through the long nights. So maybe sometimes he thought about him while he was in bed alone...maybe he even fantasied a little. But, besides that, everything was going great.

Then, tragedy struck. Okay, so it was more an ill-timed mishap than anything. On his third week, Seth made an amateur mistake.

He called home.

His mother answered the phone.

"Seth?" she asked instead of hello, panic evident in her wavering voice. Even without seeing her face, he could tell that she hadn't been sleeping right. And he felt guilty. He'd been allowed to only think of himself. He could pretend that no one else mattered, but this was proof that he wasn't the only one hurting. His heart was beating very fast and breaking just a little more each time his mother said his name. He'd never meant to hurt her. Desperately, he wanted to forget about everything and hear his Mother tell him everything was going to be okay. So what if he was a Momma's boy? He sure as hell didn't care.

Seth was about to respond when he heard Ryan in the background over the mix of voices. Before he could stop himself, think logically, he hung up, fingers shaking. He counted on the phone booth to hold him up as he leaned against it.

There was no escaping it now, everything was about to be turned upside down...

Seth had learned two very important lessons in the past few weeks: 1) whiskey good, 2)thinking bad. Tyler had been instrumental in helping him figure out those two facts. They hung out most of the time when Tyler wasn't working. They didn't do much, just drank and talked shop --AKA talked about comics and Ryan. Anna had been the only person to truly understand his comic obsession until he met Tyler. And no one else knew about his secret crush. It felt nice to have someone to confide in that understood what he was going through.

Seth sorted through the mess of his clothes trying to find something clean to wear. He picked up a gray t-shirt and smelled it. It was just a little bit musky, but not too bad. It would have to do. He pulled the shirt on over his head and pulled on a pair of jeans. Reaching into his pocket, he realized his wallet was once again missing. He'd never been too careful with his things and being on his own without Rosa to find his misplaced items had taught him a whole new appreciation for their cleaning lady.

Looking under the bed, Seth didn't even look up when he heard footsteps and then the door creaking open. "I'll be there in a minute, just gotta grab my wallet."

Tyler was supposed to be meeting him and he had no reason to suspect it was anyone else. Until...

"Seth?" came a tentative voice.

Seth whirled around, narrowly missing a collision with the bedside table. "Ryan?!"

Seth stood, wallet in hand, and faced Ryan. He looked back at the messy bed, the tissues on the floor, the half bottle of whiskey Tyler had given him and slowly faced Ryan again.