Home for the Summer (BOYXBOY)

Mountains Between Us: Part 2

Trigger warning for this chapter! Please scroll down to the author's note at the bottom for more details.

The plan was shaky at best, and irresponsible at worst.

I booked the earliest flight I could and spent the two hours I had in the airport stalking down Nico's friends on Instagram. I wasn't really a social media guy. Yeah, no. This was out of my comfort zone.

But, when I went through Nico's tagged photos, I kept seeing the same girl over and over. She was the only one who posted photos of him outside of hockey. In the airport Starbucks, just fifteen minutes before boarding, I DMed a stranger about the boy I loved.

@apollo.quinn
hey! this is a little strange... bear with me.

The girl's name was Jackie. Nico talked about her months ago, but nothing specific. As it turned out, Jackie was incredibly helpful. She told me the hospital Nico was staying at and offered me a ride there from the airport. Jackie mentioned that Nico told her all about me, and that she was planning on giving me a stern talking to on the drive there. Fair enough.

And so, I threw myself into the sky to find Nicolas Young. So much for being an over planner.

The time I spent on that plane was the longest six hours of my life. I tried to read, but no part of my brain could focus on anything other than Nicolas. What if he was seriously hurt now? What if he had to stay in the hospital again? What if coming to Vermont was the wrong idea? Oh, god, can I afford a ticket home? Should I bother showing up at all?

When I left the airport, there stood Jackie, holding up a cardboard sign with "Ollie" written on it. It'd been forever since anyone had called me that. I almost didn't recognize my name.

"You're lucky I was in town," she said, throwing my bag into her trunk. "I just got back from New York last night."

"Oh, New York?"

"Yep. I was in a show over there."

"You're an actor?"

"Did Nicolas never tell you that?"

I let out an uncomfortable laugh and slipped into her passenger seat. "I don't know... He didn't talk too much about his life here."

"I can see why." She glanced back at me. "He's sad here, Ollie. I mean... He always seemed kinda sad, especially last semester, but after this summer... It was like he had this new light inside of him. But, you kinda ruined that. He hasn't lit up in a long time."

"Do you think he hates me?"

Jackie started her car and turned out of the parking spot. "I think he hates that he loves you, if that makes sense. Nicolas wants to get over it, but he can't."

"Yeah," I mumbled. "I get that."

"I hope you know that I'm pissed with you."

"I figured."

"Do you want to know why?"

"I don't know. Do I?"

"Last year," she shook her head, "I thought that Nicolas and I were going out. We weren't. Obviously. I'm not clueless. I mean, I've done theatre my whole life. I know when someone's gay." This made me laugh a bit, but she looked serious. "So, yeah, whatever. I got over that pretty quickly, and we started being friends. And then he was hospitalized for his eating disorder, and I was there for him. We were there for each other. But, all of a sudden, he takes a three month long vacation to California and falls in love with this poet."

I smiled in spite of myself and Jackie let out a breath. "He talked about you all the time when he got home. Said he was flying back to you for fall, and that he didn't even mind missing the trees change color, because he would have you. And everyday, he'd get all excited. 'I'm sure Ollie will text today', and all this nonsense. But, after a couple weeks, it was clear that you had no interest in him. And Nicolas got really upset."