“Yeah.”
I crawl toward him, the carpet rough under my palms, until our knees almost touch. I want to pull him to my body and tell him that I love him. I want to go back to right before the Zoom call. I want everything to be pleasant.
It isn’t.
“You should have called me,” I repeat. I hesitate. “And I really wish that Gaby had told you the truth too. I-I just wanted to be a good friend. I didn’t think I was signing away my friendship to you.”
I wonder if I’ve said too much. I wonder if he’ll defend his sister and storm out. I don’t think so, but I’m not sure.
“I wish she’d said that too.” He inhales. “She fought really hard for custody of me when I was a teenager. She was worried she would have to fight you for custody.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Yes. It is. You’re the best person I know, Axel. I don’t know how she could have thought anything else, but it’s my fault. I-I criticized you after she told me you were the father. I said you partied a lot.”
My heart thuds. I think of the three years I didn’t have Enzo in my life. I think of the pain. The confusion. The anger.
All because Enzo thought I’d slept with his sister. I chew my bottom lip. “Why was it such a big deal for me to sleep with her?”
He glances up at me.
“I didn’t,” I remind him hastily. “I didn’t. But you know sometimes best friends do date their best friends’ siblings, sometimes they even marry them. And you know, the best friends get to see their best friends more. And they like it. They’re a family.”
“Oh.” Enzo looks down. His skin is pinker than before. “I really liked you back then.”
“We were best friends.”
He shakes his head. “No.”
I frown.
“I mean, yes, we were best friends.”
I exhale.
“But you were also more,” he says. “I was in love with you, Axel. I loved you from the first day we met. I’ve always been yours. And—and I know it’s bad to tell you now. And you might just want me to leave, and I-I understand that. I do. I wouldn’t want that, but I do understand that.”
I stare at Enzo. “You dated Sofia.”
He blushes. “That was a mistake. I apologized to her. I-I shouldn’t have done that. I thought I was probably gay, but I wasn’t sure, since, you know, girls are pretty, and some people are bisexual and?—”
“You were eighteen,” I say.
“I was eighteen.” He glances at me. “And you were always hooking up with women and talking about how great women are and?—”
I pull him toward me. I inhale his scent and crush him against my chest. His arms tighten around me, fingers twisting into the back of my shirt like he’s afraid I’ll dissolve.
“That must have been horrible,” I say. “I’m sorry. You should have told me.”
“I didn’t want the chance that I might lose you from my life,” he says.
I frown. I’m not sure what eighteen-year-old or nineteen-year-old or twenty-year-old me would have done if Enzo had told me he loved me. Maybe we would have gotten together. But I’m not sure. I’m not confident.
What if he’s right? What if I’d just said that ‘sucks bro’ and repeated that I was straight? What if I’d decided that it was probably a bad idea to spend so much time with him? What if I’d tried to set him up with men?
I hope we would have gotten together, and maybe we would have, but… I swallow hard. I’d been obsessed with joining the NHL back then, and back then, there hadn’t been any out players. I hadn’t considered myself attracted to men, even though, face it, I was. Would I have said something idiotic like ‘thank you’?
“I was a fool back then,” I say instead. “I don’t know why I didn’t kiss you. I don’t know why I didn’t put together that the fact that I wanted to spend all my time with you meant something huge. I-I wish I had.”
