“Yes?” Dell eventually asked, a lilt of curiosity in his voice.
Luca cleared his throat.
“When you came here however long ago, after you’d fallen for them. And you were talking about, like—I don’t know. Being open, and stuff, in your relationship.”
Dell shifted in his chair until he was facing Luca, but Luca still couldn’t look at him. His face was burning.
“Yes?” Dell said again, the curiosity in his voice turning more…curious.
“That’s not actually—that’s not really what I wanted to ask about, but I remember you saying you’d been reading things, about different relationships and stuff, and?—”
Luca pressed his lips together, irritated with himself. His arms were still crossed over his chest. He needed to just ask it.
Because he was sure about this. About selling the cabin, about all of it.
Like, ninety-eight percent sure.
He just needed to talk it out with one more person. One more person who wasn’t his mom, who could be more objective about it all maybe.
“Do you think it’s possible to be in love with two people at once?”
“Of course,” Dell answered easily. And then, perhaps sensing that this casualness didn’t immediately soothe Luca’s feelings, he added, “But I don’t think I used to truly believe that, before Mae—and you, honestly—made me think about stuff more. We’re raised to believe in a single soulmate, in two people falling in love and getting married and having a happily ever after. But sometimes life is messier than that.”
“Yeah.” Luca swallowed, still staring resolutely at the horizon. This was more what he’d wanted to hear, even if it wasessentially what his mom had said, too. Even if what she’d talked about that day still felt like a different thing to Luca because Jayden was alive. They all were, navigating this breathing, squirming, evolving thing.
“Is that…what’s happening with you and Emerson? Does he want to be open?”
Luca shook his head. “No. No. It’s just—he and his ex-husband still love each other. Like, they havebothexplicitly told me that. And they’re not together anymore, so it’s nothing like that; it’s just?—”
“Scary?”
“Yeah.” God, that. “It’s really fucking scary.”
“Do you trust him? That he can love both you and his ex?”
“I do.” Not that Emerson had said the specificwords to him yet, either, but—Luca just felt it, every time Emerson looked at him. “I really do, so I don’t—I’m sorry. I don’t know why I asked you about this at all. I’m being?—”
“Hey. Luca. Stop. The expectations society pushes on us go a lot deeper than we realize a lot of the time, so I get why you’re fucked up about this. Why you need to talk about it with someone who isn’t Emerson. And hey, remember how I said you falling in love with someone else made me jealous? Even though we’ve barely talked in over a year? Even though I’m still fully in love with Mae? I wasn’t joking, Luca. You can feel messy and jealous about this.”
Damn. Dell was being…wonderful. Maybe that’s why Luca wanted to talk to him about this. Because he knew he would be.
He probably also wanted to talk to Dell because he was queer, and with respect to his straight mom, this whole thing felt super fucking queer to him. Only queer people would still love their exes so openly. Luca hated gay people sometimes.
“He’s also the other dad of Emerson’s kid,” Luca said. “Who…I also love. So…we’ll be in each other’s orbit a lot. If I do this, if I go all in.”
“And considering you want to sell this place, I’d say you’re all in.”
“Yeah. I really am.”
And as soon as the words were out of his mouth, Luca felt them in his bones. God, hewas. He was so in. He felt suddenly antsy, like the two remaining percentage points of his doubts had just evaporated into thin air. He was ready to tell Emerson, about all of it; ready to make his peace with this place; ready to go find cardboard boxes.
“In that case…” Dell finally turned, looking back out at the ocean too. “I think your best option is to try to fall a little in love with Emerson’s ex, too.”
Luca laughed. Fucking queer people. But when Dell didn’t join in, he wondered if it was the right reaction.
When he looked over, though, Dell was smiling.
“I mean, maybe not actually, not unless you’d all be into that. But what I mean is, don’t view him as your enemy, someone who’s taking something away from you. If you all love the kid, maybe try to view things around that. So it’s not just this other guy the person you love is still in love with. It’s this guy who’s now part of your family. Because if you’re moving in with this guy, Luca, and he has a kid—you’re all a family now.”
