Now it was the following Friday after an equally blissful week, and Teddy was finally joining one of Finn’s bonfires, staring at the pictures on Finn’s end table in the living room. They’d grown so close since that fateful day they met off Teddy’s patio, but this was the first time he’d been inside Finn’s house.
The newest photos on display were of Finn and Rose with an older gentleman who Teddy took for Rose’s father, given the resemblance. There was also a photo of a couple that Finn hadclearly gotten a combination of his features from—eyes from his mother, smile from his father. His parents—before the accident when his mother died and his father was left needing full-time care.
Another photo included young Finn, who had the same smile as he did now, the same bright spark of life that was so infectious. Sometimes adult Finn had trouble believing in that brightness no matter how much he instilled it in others, but he was trying, something Teddy felt like he could finally do too.
“Good-looking couple, right?” Finn said, startling Teddy with his reappearance from the kitchen. He carried a platter of chips and crackers to bring outside, along with a six-pack of beer. Teddy had meant to follow him and help until he got distracted by the display of memories.
He took the six-pack from Finn now. “You had to get your looks from somewhere,” he said, meaning the sentiment, however teasing in tone. “They seem like they were really happy. You too.”
“We were.” Finn gazed fondly at the photos, not quite as sad as Teddy would have expected, more contemplative. “We were happy, and I had them taken away from me. You had a father you would have been better off without and removed him from your life because you wanted him gone.
“Either way, it seems unfair. I know even for people who have happy families and get to keep them, everyone has personal tragedies. I see plenty every day….” He trailed off, then took a breath and shifted his gaze back to Teddy. “Just means we have to try harder to make the most of what we have. And be thankful… for what we have….” He leaned closer, a playful twitch at his lips. “When what we have is truly beautiful.” He kissed Teddy, and Teddy melted into the touch, allowing the faint parting of lips and flick of their tongues.
“Smooth talker.”
“Got you into bed, didn’t it?”
Teddy snorted, pulling back to shake his head at Finn. He had gotten him into bed more than once now. “Are you saying we should bring these snacks back into the kitchen and tell everyone to go home?”
“Tempting, but Rose would never forgive me if we did that. Later,” Finn said, kissing Teddy once more before leading them toward the patio. “Just because you live next door doesn’t mean you have to go home when everyone else leaves.”
Imp, Teddy thought, not for the first time, and followed Finn with a pleasant flutter in his stomach that he’d felt from day one, but it was much better now that he’d given in to the disruption in his life.
There hadn’t been much to disrupt, just a path laid out that included warmth he’d often been missing that went far beyond a bonfire on the beach.
The fire was nice, though, with spring rapidly turning into summer, friends gathered near the water’s edge for food and booze and good conversation. Teddy was back to being careful with his alcohol, never more than a drink or two since it wasn’t his style and his medication would be long-term for several more months, but a beer on the beach with company wasn’t as loathsome as he’d feared that first day when a volleyball rolled in front of his chair.
“Glad to have you with us,” Blaise said. The crew was all couples—Blaise and Rose, Meagan and Ronnie, Teddy and Finn—except for Carlos, who didn’t seem bothered by being the seventh wheel when he had a plane to catch in the morning to see Erina’s ballet.
“I guess Rick and Dan are picking me up?” he said like a question to Teddy.
“My condolences.” Teddy grinned.
“Dude,” Carlos whined, “I thoughtyouwere scary. If you’re the easy one, I am so screwed.”
“I’m scary?”
“W-well… not after I got to know you!”
The others chuckled, Finn especially, though it was Rose who said, “The only thing scary about Teddy is his terrible taste in snacks.” She indicated the can of spray cheese by his chair that he lifted now to cover the surface of a cracker. “We have real cheese.”
“My dear,” Teddy said loftily, “if I’m going to indulge, then I am going to indulge thoroughly.” And he popped the cracker into his mouth with a satisfied crunch.
“Bet that’s not the first time you’ve heard that,” Carlos muttered near Finn’s shoulder, who laughed and pushed him away hard enough that his chair nearly toppled the other direction.
Teddy didn’t deny a thing.
His phone buzzed amid the others’ tittering, and like many of the messages he’d received lately, this was from Dan, mentioning he was looking for engineering projects in the area as an excuse to visit, partially because Rick was planning a beach getaway sooner rather than later to help beat his writer’s block.
“Speaking of indulgences,” Teddy said, “you’re all in trouble once my friends stay for longer than a weekend. Rick might even be coming back with you on the same flight,” he told Carlos, “and Dan isn’t far behind.”
“Dan’s the safe one, right?” Carlos asked.
“Safe is not the word I’d use, but you’ll get along. It’s more your liver you should worry about and the epic ways they’ll make you blush.”
Carlos promptly blushed right then, no doubt imagining those scenarios.
He was doomed.
