Home for the Summer (BOYXBOY)

6 | Understood

I couldn't stop watching Nicolas Young as he scaled the ocean.

I was on the sand, pretending to read, while he and Benji surfed in front of me. Nicolas had gained about a thousand muscles. I wondered if he was a "gym-bro". Did he play football? Lift weights? Did I know anything about him anymore? My mind began to spiral on the shore and, even though I hadn't touched the water, it felt like I was drowning right there. My thoughts swallowed me whole.

I don't know him at all.

I'm not his friend anymore.

He probably hates who I've become.

"Ollie," Nicolas yelled as he ran in from the water. His hair was dripping down in messy curls and his entire body shined with salt water. I took a breath and smiled.

"Hey. Everything going alright?"

He tilted his head to the side as he met the end of my towel. "Aren't you bored?"

"Eh... I have my book so, I'm fine. No need to worry."

"If you say so," he replied before collapsing into the sand with a sigh. I had hardly noticed how long we'd been there. The sun was hanging low in the sky, peaking lazily above the horizon. It had to be 7 by then. "I'm so tired. How is Benji still out there?"

"He's a machine on the water. Like, I don't think he would stop surfing if he had the choice." Nico laughed at this, and it felt familiar, like the rattle of cicadas through his chest or the low murmur of thunder from a distance. He's different now, but I know him. I know his laugh, his family, his eyes. I've known him for 9 years. We're only realigning.

"Do you ever get lonely here?" he asked me, squinting into the sky.

"Sometimes. But, I have Benji and my mom... It's not too bad."

"Really? You never get lonely with just them?"

"I don't know. Do you get lonely in Vermont?"

Nicolas took a breath. "All the time. I... don't think I have a single friend there."

"Really?"

"I mean... I have people to sit with in classes and at lunch and I hang with them after school sometimes, but they don't really get me."

"What do you mean?"

His eyes flickered between me and the sky for a moment.

"I don't know... I just don't feel like myself around them."

I nodded. "I know how you feel. I only really feel like myself around a couple of people."

"But you don't feel lonely?"

"I think," I started, "That it doesn't matter how many people understand you as long as you have someone who does."

"So, you feel understood here?"

I took a long time to reply, because I wasn't fully sure whether or not I understood myself. Sometimes, I felt buried underneath my own thoughts and other people's opinions and, as hard as I tried to dig myself out, everything kept flooding in. I was suffocating, and maybe Nicolas felt like that, too. But, that answer wasn't easy to chew, so I gave him something simple.

"I think so," I said. "Do you have anyone who understands you? Jackie, maybe?"

"Jackie's... Great. But, there's some stuff I can't tell anyone."

I hesitated. "Stuff about your mom?"

He looked at me for a moment before shrugging. "Yeah," he said. "Nobody in Vermont knows about our... situation, and I kind of wanted it to stay that way."

"Is that why you fled all the way to California?"

There was a beat before he replied. "My friends think I'm on vacation right now."

"I'm sorry," I mumbled.

"For what?"

"I'm just... sorry," I repeated, because sometimes, that's the only thing to say. I think he got what I was trying to convey, though.

I'm sorry your mom can't stay sober.

I'm sorry she's back in rehab.

I'm sorry we've acted like everything's normal.

I'm sorry I was standoffish at first.

I'm sorry I never called.

I'm sorry you haven't touched salt water in 5 years.

"Hey," I said after a beat. "How about we just try to understand each other?"

"That sounds nice," he smiled. "Right. My name's Nico."

He extended a hand to me and I shook it. "I'm Ollie. Nice to meet you."

***

I think there was a certain similarity that hung above me and my mother's heads. We were always sort of connected. Even as a little kid, I could tell almost exactly what she was thinking at all times. She could give me one look and know what was weighing on my conscious and now, as Nicolas walked sleepily upstairs to the bathroom to rinse the sand from his hair, my mother gave me a judgmental once-over.

"What?" I said, reaching into the fridge for a bottle of soda.

She was smiling from behind her glasses. "I didn't say anything."

"You don't have to. You're giving me that look."

"What 'look'?"

I popped the top of my bottle off against the counter and rolled my eyes. "The look you get when you think you know something. Out with it."

"I just... Want you to know I support whoever you grow up to be." I furrowed my brows before she flashed a smile and I all but choked on my soda.

"What are you implying?" I asked, because I knew exactly what she was hinting at.

"Nicolas is a very nice boy."

"I cannot believe you," I whisper-screamed, pointing towards the stairs. "You are ridiculous."

"Really? Is it so ridiculous to assume that-"

"This conversation is over," I added in before beginning up the stairs.

"Apollo, I want to discuss this! It's important to me that you know I love you always!"

"Yes, mom. I'm very aware," I said. "But, there is nothing happening between Nicolas Young and I. He has a girlfriend- Sort of."

"Right... In Vermont," she smiled. "Does she know he's sleeping next door to a very handsome young man?"

"...No," I said. "He told his friends he was on vacation. Not that it would matter to her what Nico was doing with his friend."

"Oh? We're using old nicknames now?"

I could feel myself redden and immediately let out a groan, running up the stairs to my bedroom. Once in bed, the sound of Nicolas's shower running became the only thing I could hear. I stared out my window for a very long time and wondered what everyone in the world was doing at this exact moment. Benji was fast asleep or eating leftover pizza. My father was just waking up. My schoolmates were at each other's houses, soaking in all summer had to offer. And, there I was; staring at the ceiling, pondering who I was.

I wanted to change before school started up. I wanted to do something. I was 17 years old and I had pretty much nothing to show for it. Benji had lived. Nicolas had lived. All I had done was watched.

"Hey," Nicolas said from the doorway. His hair was messy and a towel was thrown over his shoulders. I hadn't even heard the shower stop. "Do you wanna go somewhere?"