It's a little sad to see this story end, this and Summer Romance were my favorites to write. Thanks to everyone for the reviews.

tormented soul, hockeylover and supergirljen – Thanks for beta, editing, and general help with this story.

A/N – "Thoughts"

Chapter 15 – Always Be More Than Friends

As Gordo walked up the driveway of his parents' house and looked around, in a mix of surprise and a little happiness, he noted how everything seemed to look the same. It was weird being back home, he hadn't been in Hill Ridge for the past two years. "Since we broke up."

Sighing, he let his father walk ahead of him and open the front door. After graduating with honors from Harvard, Gordo was moving back west and he had been accepted to USC for graduate school.

Walking inside, he could hear a party going on in the backyard. His mother had insisted on throwing a welcome back party for him. Gordo was pretty sure she would be there. Part of him, wanted to run back to Boston and another part was really curious about how she may have changed in the past two years.

After dragging his luggage up to his room and changing into a t-shirt and shorts, he slowly walked back downstairs. Taking a deep breath, he walked out into the backyard.

As he stood in the backyard, looking around and seeing who was actually here, he heard a familiar voice yell his name. Than suddenly his vision was filled with blonde hair. "Gordo!"

Gordo laughed as Lizzie jumped into his arms and fiercely hugged him. "I missed you," she told him as she was back on her feet.

"I missed you too Liz," he said as he looked her over. Gordo grinned as he realized he was looking at the same old Lizzie, just older. "How's the brand new teacher?" Gordo asked her.

Lizzie had graduated from USC with a degree in elementary education and like Gordo, was going to be at USC going for her masters while teaching elementary school in Hill Ridge. "Excited. I can't believe I'm gonna be teaching at Hill Ridge Elementary. Its gonna be so weird. I wonder if Mrs. Ornstein is still there?" They both shared a laugh at the thought of their old third grade teacher who they thought had to have been ancient back then. "What about you Mr. Director?" Lizzie asked with a smile.

"While I work on my masters, I got a paid internship at Warner Brothers that I start in a few weeks. I gotta start looking for an apartment, I love my parents but I don't really want to live at home again for very long," Gordo told her.

"I know someone who has couch you can crash on," Lizzie suggested with a grin.

Gordo closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. "We're barely talking, I think the last thing we need is to be living together." He paused and shuffled his feet, "Is she here?" Gordo asked softly.

Lizzie snickered, "Yea and she's just as nervous about seeing you."

"I'm not nervous," Gordo said stuffing his hands in his pockets.

She just laughed, "I'm gonna get something to eat. Give me a call when you get settled. I really want you and Chris to meet," Lizzie said and then kissed his cheek before walking over to the grill. Chris had been her boyfriend for the past year and half and things were getting serious between them; she really wanted to get Gordo's opinion of him. Even after they'd broken up, Lizzie and Gordo were still extremely close, almost like brother and sister.

After watching Lizzie walk away, he went back to looking around. Seeing Ethan and Kate huddled together, he smiled. A few months ago, on Valentine's Day, Ethan proposed to Kate. He had called him excitedly the next day, begging him to be his best man.

Watching them, he started to think about his other friends. Larry had graduated from Princeton and was now in New York working on his law degree at Columbia. Veruca was wrapping up the last of her finals at Stanford and was coming back next week. Finally, Claire would be flying in tomorrow after graduating from NYU.

His smile widened a little as he thought about Claire. They had become close friends during college, especially when Larry and her broke up towards the end of freshman year. Kate had asked him to check on her, to make sure she was ok. Gordo had taken two trains to New York City to check on her. While the breakup had been mutual, it still hurt both of them. From that a real friendship grew. Than when Gordo and Miranda broke up in the middle of their junior year, it was Claire who came to Boston to be there for him.

The summer between junior and senior year when Gordo had stayed in Boston, cause he didn't want to face Miranda at home, Claire stayed in Boston for the summer with him and it lead to an ill fated romance between the two. At the end of summer, they broke it off, realizing he was on the rebound and their friendship meant more to them than some fling. "But it was still a hell of a summer," he thought with a smile.

A little later, as Gordo was talking to Matt and Melina, he happened to glance across the yard and finally saw her. Miranda was standing by herself, staring out into space. He could tell she was in her own little world. Excusing himself from Matt and Melina, he slowly walked over to her and did his best to ignore the voice in his head that was telling him to turn around and run.

Miranda didn't notice him standing in front of her, Gordo grinned a little as he watched her. "She's still gorgeous." She was wearing a sky blue t-shirt, jeans, a pair of sandals. Clearing his throat, he watched Miranda's head snap up and when she saw Gordo standing in front of her, her breath caught in her throat.

"Hi," he said weakly.

"Hi."

"How are you?" Gordo asked. "Well that was lame."

"Good. I graduated magna cum lauda," she answered. "Idiot."

"Congratulations," he told her.

"Thanks. I start work in a few weeks."

"Cool," Gordo said, "Where are you working."

"Markson Media. It's an advertising firm in LA, I'm gonna help create marketing campaigns and stuff," Miranda told him.

They fell into an awkward silence, neither sure what to say. "What were you day dreaming about?" Gordo asked, trying to think of something to talk about.

Miranda blushed a little and her lips twitched like she wanted to smile. "The Adirondacks," she simply stated.

Gordo smiled at the memory, "It was a fun weekend."

She frowned, "It was denying the inevitable."

Right before Miranda and Gordo broke up, they made a last ditch effort to save their relationship by renting a cabin in the Adirondacks for a long weekend together. While the weekend was great, it was just denying the inevitable. All the problems they had left, were there waiting for them upon their return.

"We grew apart," he said simply.

When they started college, they saw each other every weekend. After awhile, increased workloads and different commitments lead them to seeing each other every other weekend. They really didn't notice anything changing, even when they barely saw each other once a month. But not seeing each other, lead them to have more arguments and the more arguments they had, the uglier they got.

"So how's Claire?" Miranda asked bitterly. That was another thing that happened because of their arguments; Miranda blamed Claire for coming in between them.

Gordo rubbed his forehead, "Do we have to have this argument again?" Miranda was about to say something but Gordo cut her off, "Claire is my friend. Only my friend. When we were going out, I was faithful to you. Claire was just a sounding board when I got frustrated with you. We didn't even think of trying anything until the summer after we broke up."

Miranda looked at him, not sure what to think. Gordo stepped up to her, "Why would I lie to you now?"

Miranda sighed sadly. "I'm sorry. I don't really blame Claire anymore. I was just trying to blame someone for our problems," she paused for a moment, "I've been thinking about us lately. We never really dealt with our problems, we did everything but actually deal with them."

Gordo nodded and then watched as Miranda reached up with her left hand and rubbed her neck. "Your still wearing the ring," he noted with a small smile.

Miranda smiled a little as she looked at her hand. "I didn't keep it off for very long. It didn't just represent our relationship but our friendship too and we're still friends, right?"

"We'll always be friends," Gordo told her. "I've missed you."

Miranda sighed again and looked into his eyes, "I've missed you too."

He ran his hand through his hair and looked down at the ground, "There anyone new in your life?" he asked cautiously. He really didn't want to pry, especially cause they were finally cutting through the awkwardness and reestablishing their friendship. But just seeing her, brought back a lot of those old feelings he had made himself believe were gone.

Miranda shook her head no. "How about you?" she asked with a little anxiousness in her voice.

"Nope," Gordo answered. He watched Miranda fight back a smile. "Could those old feelings be returning for her too?" he thought. "Could we really have a second chance?" Taking a deep breath, "I think no matter what, we would've broken up. It would've been something else."

Miranda nodded in agreement. "I think it was also cause we were young and moving too fast."

"Yea but its hard to ignore such strong feelings," he paused for a moment, taking a deep breath to try and calm his suddenly nervous stomach, "and maybe impossible to let them go."

Miranda looked at him for a moment, "Yea." She took a step closer to him and their faces were inches apart.

Miranda's scent was filling all of Gordo's senses; it was like being drunk.

"Your staying here now, right?" she asked him in an almost whisper.

"Yea," he said as his voice cracked slightly.

Miranda bit her lip and tried to squash her own nervous feeling. "Me too." She started to fidget with the ring, "Do you still love me?" Miranda asked suddenly, trying to keep her face blank.

Gordo swallowed the lump in his throat and tried to remain focused, "Do you still love me?" he asked back. He didn't want to tip his hand before he knew how she felt.

As they stared intently into each other's eyes, their lips moved towards each other like magnets. "I asked you first," Miranda mumbled before their lips meshed together. The world seemed to slip away around them as they passionately kissed and their arms slipped around each other..

Breaking only because they needed air, they looked at each other. "I still love you." they said breathlessly in unison and smiled at each other.

"Second chance?" Gordo asked hopefully.

Miranda smiled, "It'll be hard but I love you too much to just let you go again."

Gordo smiled back at her and wrapped his arms around her and hugged her. "I don't want to let you go either. We're older, maybe a little wiser, and I know we can really handle whatever happens."

Standing together for a few minutes, Gordo took her left hand and asked, "What would you say if I were to replace that ring."

Miranda took her hand back quickly, "No! I love this ring. I don't want you to replace it."

After giving her a quick kiss to calm her down, "Ok, replace is the wrong word. What if I were to give you another ring someday." He grinned at her confused expression. "Maybe something that had just a diamond in it."

Smiling, she got what he was saying, "Than I'd be very happy, someday." Tightening her arms around his waist, she rested her head on his shoulder and nuzzled his neck.

As Gordo held her, he smiled. "When I get you that diamond ring someday, we'll both be very happy."