Oliver

It felt strange to be hitting the buzzer at Enrique's families mansion, though checking to see if their gate code had remained the same would definitely be stranger. It had been so long since I had been here last, only really recognizing the architecture of the actual building due to the sheer amount the yard had changed. They had stopped having their bushes cut into shapes and patterns, now utilizing a more natural look and had expanded their koi pond, which must have been double the size I remembered. The only real nostalgia I felt for the over-sized yard was due to the entry way remaining in a state of fine gravel, a unique choice that our mothers used to bicker about back when we were children.

Taking a deep breath, I hit the call button on the side of the stone archway, twiddling my thumbs as I waited for a response, which came rather quickly.

"Tornatore residence," A magnified voice spoke, "State your business."

"Enzo?" I asked, recognizing the voice of their longest working butler immediately. "This is Oliver Boulanger."

For a moment he said nothing, clearly needing some time to recall who I was.

"Oliver?" He asked after the brief pause. "Victor and Olivia's boy?"

"Of course." I smiled awkwardly at the small camera lens, tucking an out of place strand of hair behind my ear and adjusting my beret. "Would it be possible for me to come in? I need to speak to Enrique."

A loud buzzing took over the line as the front gate opened, allowing me entry to the large walkway and through the gardens. Although it would have been faster for me to rent a car and come in through the driving quarters, there was a part of me that had missed his families garden, currently blooming with the new life of spring. I would have liked to slow down, even, taking in my surroundings. It was something I knew the moment the gate opened wouldn't have been an option, Enzo now in the front doorway of the vestibule before I was even half way there.

"Oliver!" He said excitedly, stepping out of the entryway just as I had made it to the bottom of the steps and walking down to greet me with hands held out in front of him. "Look at you, all grown up! You're just a perfect blend of your parents, now, aren't you!"

I couldn't help but smile at his excited recognition of me, even if I had long grown tired of hearing how much I looked like my parents. Mothers eyes, fathers hair, mothers side of the family's body type, fathers complexion… I'd heard it many times. In my own personal opinion, the one I resembled the most was my little sister. Enrique on the other hand, no matter how much he tried to deny it, was a spitting image of his mom, only inheriting a head of natural curls he never bothered learning how to maintain from his dad's side.

"It's nice seeing you again, Enzo." I exclaimed, allowing him to place a hand on my shoulder while walking the stone steps. "Sometimes I forget how long its been."

"I believe you were just a boy the last time I saw you. Is your family doing well?"

"Very much so. Mama and Papa haven't changed much, Vicky is in her last year of secondary school, though. She couldn't have been more than thirteen the last time Enrique saw her."

"Yes, that sounds correct, and I must say that with her being of age now it would be best to keep them apart." He laughed. "I've been raising that boy since he was in diapers and I swear he was a flirt fresh out of the womb."

I giggled into my hand, following him through the doorway and into the large entry of the home. I was able to catch sight of his mother rather quickly, speaking loudly on a cell phone that was currently on speaker mode regarding some sort of event his fathers work was putting on. Something about an ice sculpture centerpiece.

"I'll call you back." She stated as she took notice of me, quickly ending the phone call. "Well," She smiled widely, "If it isn't Oliver!"

Although it was clear she had not been expecting me, seeing as I had shown up unannounced, his mother approached me without a moments hesitation, wrapping her arms around my shoulders and planting a kiss on my cheek. "How are you, dear?"

" Buongiorno, Mrs. Tornatore," I smiled. "I apologize for showing up unannounced."

"You'll apologize for no such thing, mio caro. You're welcome here any time. Are you looking for Enrique?"

I nodded.

"Is he around?"

"In his bedroom, most likely. I heard some movement up there earlier so I believe he's awake. It's so strange having my little boy suddenly acting like an adult. I never thought I'd see the day where he was up and moving before noon." She laughed. "I'm sure you know what I mean, you were a teenager not long ago, either." Touching a hand to my cheek, she gave me a quick once over, taking in the idea that we were no longer children. I had a sister who wasn't quite finished growing up, but Enrique? He was her baby, his oldest brother being nearly an adult himself at his birth. "I'm sure you're just as charming as you were back then. The ladies must be all over you."

I cocked an eyebrow, giving her a confused glance but saying nothing. She wasn't the first person to say something to be about girls, but I had been confident that she had been told about my attraction toward men. Enrique's family liked to talk and nothing was ever off limits. In fact, it was quite well known that if you didn't want your secrets spilled, you never told them to an Italian.

"I take it I can go and speak to Enrique, then?" I asked, trying to cut the conversation short. After all, his mother wasn't the person I was here to see.

"Of course." She smiled, waving an arm in the direction I already knew would lead me there. We had hung out in each others bedrooms many times, going through phases together and spending many nights deciding that we should redecorate at three in the morning because we had outgrown things like Lego sets and board games. We had gotten in trouble during our preteen years for trying to paint him an accent wall. I no longer recalled where on earth we had found paint.

Walking up the wooden spiral staircase and through the hallway I could have walked blindfolded, I stepped cautiously toward his closed bedroom door, debating if it was too late for me to change my mind before taking a deep breath and knocking.

"What?" He mumbled rudely, making me question if his mother had been wrong and I had just woken him up. I didn't say anything in response, simply waiting awkwardly for him to come to the door, heart racing as the knob turned.

Clearly, he had not been expecting to see me, something that was understandable as I had given no sort of announcement that I would be coming to visit. With that being said, I had clearly caught him by surprise enough to cause him to jump backward at the sight of me, cussing in Italian and being damn near knocked off his feet the same way he had after my performance, this time not holding onto a full drink that he could spill on himself.

"What are you doing here?" He asked, not in annoyance the way that I had, but with a tone that showed clear concern. "Is everything okay?"

He moved aside enough to allow me room to enter, closing the door behind me for privacy. It was likely he didn't want anyone in his family to hear about the things that had been happening between the two of us recently, something I viewed as understandable.

"That's what I'm hoping to figure out." I sighed. His room hadn't changed much in the last five years and by what was either instinct or muscle memory I found myself drawn to the small sitting area, taking a seat on the couch I had fallen asleep on while watching movies more times than I could count. He didn't sit next to me the way he normally would have, instead plopping himself down on one of the twin armchairs and setting his hands in his lap. "I think we should talk about what happened last weekend."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean why were you in Paris. Hell, why were you watching me? Are you stalking me?"

His freckled cheeks flushed in embarrassment at my blunt question.

"I wasn't. I mean, I was in Paris, but I wasn't following you in secret or anything."

"So how did you know there was even a performance that day? Hell, how did you even know I was in an orchestra?"

His posture fell, shoulders now hunched forward and elbows resting in his lap. He picked at the beds of his nails, pulling off a loose bit of dead skin and opening up a tiny wound, which he took a moment to lick the blood off of.

"It was on your calendar."

"What?" I asked with a crinkled face. "What are you talking about?"

"When I was in your room after we-" He paused. "You have a glass calendar over your desk. The date of the show was on it along with the orchestra name. I googled it to see what it was and found you listed as a performer."

"So what, you were trying to mess me up?" Although the idea would have been extremely rude and unprofessional, it wouldn't have been unheard of from him. He had thrown popcorn at me during my solo ensemble during my fifth year, getting me back for some of the antics I had done to get a rise out of him back when he used to play soccer and I had made a game out of creating embarrassing chants in his honor. We were far too old to be playing pranks on one another, though. Besides, this wasn't a secondary school band performance. What I did now was professional and a big deal. I could get kicked out if he started messing with me.

"I wasn't doing anything." He explained, "I just wanted to see you play. I wasn't even going to tell you I was there, my plan had been to go home so that you'd have been none the wiser."

"Why, though?"

"I just wanted to see you, Oliver."

I didn't say anything, allowing an awkward silence to fill the room in the hope that he might continue speaking. I just couldn't seem to figure him out. Why was he so determined to come back into my life after leaving me all those years ago? Why had he kissed me like that during our initial conversation where I had made it clear I didn't want him back in my life?

Why was I even here?

"I don't understand." I eventually sighed. "I mean, I get why you left. I don't agree with your reasons, but I get it."

"So what don't you understand?"

"Why me?"

Now it was his turn to not speak, leaning forward into his hands and running his fingers through his thick head of hair. It was clear he wanted to say something, so why couldn't he just say it? I wasn't doing this anymore. If we had to sit here in silence for an hour then so be it. I wasn't giving him a choice, he was going to answer me.

Thankfully, it didn't take him an hour. Not even close.

"I'd hate to be the one to break it to you, but you actually don't get it at all." Enrique said. "I thought you were supposed to be the smart one."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Do you think I kissed you to prove a point?"

Now I was the one who blushed, turning away from him as I thought about the way my stomach had fluttered when our lips touched that day, even if it had only been for a second. Pushing him away had felt like a reflex, causing my heart to beg for the feeling to come back and giving me the momentum to throw myself at him, unable to dismiss the opportunity I had dreamed about since I was sixteen years old. I had practically dragged him up to my bedroom, pulling him onto my chest and undressing him within minutes, even pulling a button off of his shirt in the process. It was still sitting on my nightstand.

"It doesn't matter why you did it." I mumbled. "You still left. You abandoned me."

He stood up, walking from the chair he'd been sitting in to where I currently was on the couch, sitting down close enough to me where our hips practically touched. I could feel the heat of his body on my own, balling up the fabric of my pants tightly in my fists. If he kissed me again I wasn't sure what I would do, I didn't know if I could stop myself from accepting his mouth on my own.

"I don't think you understand how afraid I was." He said.

"Of what?"

"Of you. Of what I was feeling."

"It's not as though I was the only openly gay person that you knew," I reminded him. "I wasn't some one in a million chance freak that no one had ever discovered before. Hell, you've met some of my mothers friends, no?"

"You misunderstand. I wasn't afraid of your sexuality… I was afraid of you."

"But why, Enrique?" I could feel myself losing my patience. "What was it about me that drove you away like that? What did I ever do to you?"

"I was falling in love with you!" He yelled in a sudden outburst, looking like he was about to tear his hair right out of his scalp. "Don't you get that? You wondered so much about why you? It was only you!"

The tension that currently filled the air could have been cut with a knife, a gentle heat now filling my already red cheeks as I looked at him, head turned away from me in humiliation. That was what this entire thing had been about? Those five years were torn away from me because he's had a crush? A crush that I had mutually returned? He had broken my heart; ripped it into so many tiny pieces that I was still struggling to collect them all, and for what?

I couldn't stop looking at him, wondering how long he'd been holding onto this shame. Had he kissed me when I was seventeen, I never would have let him go. He could have given me everything I had ever wanted.

Instead, he had left.

"Enrique…" I spoke quietly. I wanted so badly to hate him, to hold onto the feeling of his betrayal for the remainder of my life. How could I ever forgive him for what he had taken away from me? Yet all I felt was a sense of calm envelope itself throughout my body, a near magnetic force drawing my hand out toward him and brushing his bangs away from his eyes. His posture angled his body awkwardly, bringing me forward before I leaned my head close to his, touching his cheek gently so that he faced me. Leaning even further from the couch, I touched my lips to his, a shock of adrenaline shooting from the beating center of my heart and up through my arms, coming out the tips of my fingers in a gentle tingle.

It only took seconds for his arms to wrap around me, my hands now caught in my center and clutching the collar of his polo as the weight of his body fell on my own. He kissed me incredibly softly, moving his fingers up the back of my shirt until he was nearing my bare shoulders. Yet still he didn't try anything inappropriate, just allowing us both the opportunity to take in the feeling of being wrapped in each others arms.

He was no longer the person who I used to know back then. He had grown more than I ever could have imagined into someone who still felt like a stranger to me. Adjusting my body, I was able to get my arms out of the hold he currently had me in, running my fingers through his hair as I held gently onto the back of his head, kissing him more forcefully in an attempt to slip my tongue into his mouth. I had expected him to immediately accept my proposition, being caught off guard when he pulled away from me.

"We shouldn't get carried away." He mumbled, sitting back up on the couch and attempting to hide his arousal. "I mean, you were right when you said we can't be doing this."

I briefly cursed my past self, wondering if it was even remotely appropriate to suggest that we could still make out on the couch so long as nothing of a sexual nature happened. He wasn't wrong, though. I struggled greatly to remain appropriate when I was with him, behaving more like a horny teenager than a twenty two year old with clear standards. It felt like he was turning me down, causing the sting of embarrassment to fill the void I had hoped to fill with, for lack of a better word, him.

"Right." I sighed. "Sorry."

"I'm the one who's sorry, Oliver."

"Enrique-"

"I know I've said it a dozen times now, but I'm not just trying to make up for the way I wronged you. I was a coward; honestly I still am. I ruined the best friendship I ever had because of my own fear and I hurt you in the process. I ruined everything that we had and I can't take that back or make it up to you."

I wanted to continue being mad at him; to not accept any sort of excuse and tell him that what he had done was unforgivable, yet all of the hatred I'd spent years building up had seemed to melt away when I caught a glimpse of those sad blue eyes looking back at me. The truth was that I never wanted to let him out of my sight again.

"You're a disaster," I smiled shyly. Moving closer to him and resting my head on his shoulder before letting out a comforting sigh.

"Yeah." He chuckled sadly. "I know."

"I need you to promise me something, Enrique."

"Anything."

I touched a hand to his leg, pulling my knees up onto the couch and leaning my body into his. He wrapped an arm around me, now holding me practically in his lap. I brought by head back up and off of his shoulder, running my thumb down from his lip to his chin.

"Never, under any circumstances, pull a stunt like that again."

"I won't."

"Because if you do, not only will I never speak to you again for the remainder of our lives, but I will physically remove your testicles with my bare hands."

He giggled nervously at my statement.

"Noted."

I was giving him a second chance. One that he, quite frankly, didn't deserve.

Enrique Tornatore was a blond haired, blue eyed bisexual disaster.

And I would never let him go again.