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“Night, little brother,” I say, smiling at him.
SIX MONTHS LATER
“Call me, every day,” Sebastian says as we stand outside of my dorm building. He and our parents have just finished the arduous task of helping me unload all of my shit and carrying it to my room. It’s warm, being August in California, and we’re all overheated and exhausted by the time everything has been moved. Dad and Gwen hugged me goodbye and then said they would be at the car. I think they wanted to give Sebastian and I some time alone. They know how close we are and how hard this is.
He was putting on a brave face as we made our way back and forth from the car to the third floor, but now he has tears filling his eyes and he sniffles as he wipes them away. Fuck, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him cry, even when he got beat up. The fact that he’s shedding tears over me is heartwarming and heartbreaking at the same time.
This is so fucking hard. We’ve been more than brothers over the last year, we’ve been best friends. And I’m going to miss the hell out of him.
Fortunately, I don’t think I’ll have to worry so much about him being bullied from now on. When Dad and Gwen found out how bad it was for him at the local public school, after an altercation that left him with a broken nose, they pulled him out and he’ll be starting at a new school in a week or so that has much better ratings and a no tolerance policy for bullying, as well as a very active LGBTQ club. I still feel guilty as hell that I wasn’t there to protect him, but when I tried to apologize he glared at me and told me if I wanted to assuage my guilt I could take him out for ice cream. Twenty minutes later we were sitting across from each other, him with his cookie dough ice cream and me with peanut butter, and laughing ourselves silly.
“Tears for me, little brother?” I say and he shakes his head.
“It’s allergies.” He sniffles again and I chuckle before embracing him, his small body almost swallowed up by mine. His crop top rides up as he wraps his arms around my neck and I feel his bare skin under my palms as I breathe in his cinnamon and apple scent. I don’t let go until he does and even then it feels too soon.
“Every day?” I ask.
“And twice on weekends,” he says, pointing his finger at me. His silver polish is peeling off and his nails are so short his finger beds are showing. It makes me hurt just to look at them. I’ve tried to get him to stop abusing them but it’s hopeless. I’ve just learned to accept it as a part of his charm.
I can’t help laughing as I reach out and tuck a stray strand of hair behind his ear.
“You better be safe,” I tell him.
“You, too.” I smile.
“I’m only a couple of hours away so I’ll be back for birthdays and holidays, and maybe even some random weekends. You’ll get sick of me.”
“I’m already sick of you,” he replies, and we both smile. Then he’s jumping into my arms again and a tear slides down my cheek when he says, “Love you, big brother.”
Fuck, how am I going to be away from him for a single day, let alone two years.
When he turns and walks away I feel like my heart is going with him.
Chapter Two
ROME
PRESENT DAY
“So how are classes?” I ask Sebastian. It’s a beautiful sunny Saturday and like every Saturday we’re sitting outside, sipping our favorite drinks at the local Starbucks. I get a chai tea latte and he orders a caramel frappuccino. Then we catch up on our weeks. Even living together again we don’t see much of each other with our class schedules and work, so we decided to make weekly Starbucks dates to make sure we got time together. The two years we were apart were the fucking worst, even though I was home quite a bit. It almost made it harder to leave him again, and sharing an on-campus apartment with him now is amazing. I feel like everything in my life makes sense again now that he’s with me once more.
“Insane but good,” he says with a grin. Sebastian is a pre-med major. He wants to be a pediatric cardiologist and I just know he’ll be amazing at it. He definitely has the determination and the smarts. I’m majoring in graphic design and hope to start an internship soon at a local tattoo parlor. When I was in a few months ago getting my second tattoo, I asked about it and they told me to send them examples of my work. When I did they said they weren't taking on interns at the moment but that I should check back in the fall, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed. They really seemed to like what I showed them.
I got my first tattoo when I was sixteen, a lily on my right side across my ribs because it was my mom’s favorite flower. My second was of a firefly on my right thigh. I got that one a couple of years ago, right after I graduated high school. Dad and Gwen paid for half of it as a graduation gift. My third and most recent one I got in support of Sebastian, and he cried when he saw it. It’s across my right shoulder blade and says Love is Love in rainbow print.
“You?” he says, before sucking loudly on his straw.
“Yeah, good,” I say.
“You work tonight?” he asks, and I shake my head.
He beams.
“Oh no. I knew I should have asked you what you had in mind before I answered that.”
He grins even wider. “There’s a party at Mel’s and I want you to go with me. He bats his long eyelashes and sticks out his full bottom lip, and I groan because I know I’m helpless to resist him when he does that.
“Fuck you,” I say, and he cheers, bouncing in his seat.
