THE WIND BLEW a soft breeze across my skin where I lay on a blanket in the thick grass, my legs stretched out and my head in Ollie’s lap. He’d wanted to work on some things around the house, small fixes or painting the shutters or something, but I wasn’t letting him get much done today.

“Truth or dare?” I said, and Ollie’s hand stilled where he’d been running his fingers through my hair.

“Really?”

“Yes, really. Truth or dare?”

“I’m a little scared of what you’d make me do if I chose dare, so…truth.”

“Truth it is,” I said, and chewed on my lip as I thought of a question. “Okay, got it. Have you ever been in love?”

He raised a brow. “That’s a loaded question.”

“I’m just curious.”

“What if you don’t like the answer?”

“Ollie…”

“Fine.” He sighed and looked out across the yard as his fingers began to move through my hair again. “Once, a long time ago, I thought I was in love.”

“You ‘thought’? Why do I hear a ‘but’ in there?”

“I’m pretty sure now that it was simply infatuation. Or maybe love on a smaller scale. Like loving the person, but not being in love with them.”

“How do you figure the difference?”

He looked down at me. “Because when someone else comes along and blows away every dream and expectation you ever had, no one else means a damn thing. Past, present, or future.”

My heart swelled to bursting as I asked, “Do you think you could love someone like me?”

He smiled and pushed my hair off my forehead. “Yes. I do.”

The unspoken words hovered in the air, but I held back from saying them, instead sitting up and pushing Ollie to the ground. He let out a surprised laugh as I straddled his hips.

“There something you want?” he asked, a teasing smile on his lips.

My erection strained against my pants as I leaned over him, grinding myself over the top of him as his cock swelled in response to mine. “Mhmm,” I said, as I bit down gently on his full lower lip.

“Tell me,” he murmured against my mouth.

“I think you know.”

He pulled his head back, and I fell into his warm green gaze. “Tell me anyway.”

“I want you, Ollie.” I brushed a kiss across his lips and whispered, “I’ll always want you.”

I woke up with a jolt, panting as I sat straight up in my bed. Sweat trickled down my neck as I brought my fingers to my mouth, the feel of Ollie’s lips still velvety soft on mine. My dick jerked under the flimsy material of my briefs, my body responding favorably to the memory. Because that’s what it was, wasn’t it? A memory. Not a dream. Not a hallucination. A fucking memory.

I’d been with Ollie. I’d been with Ollie. Ollie. No matter how I tried to say it, I couldn’t wrap my brain around what I knew now to be true. All I’d done for the past seventy-two hours was lie here and try to filter through the chunks and fragments I remembered to make sense of things. Well, I’d alternated between the bed and the couch, and at one point I ordered pizza so I wouldn’t have to venture out anywhere or starve, but other than that, the only thing that moved was my mind.

My thoughts shuffled between things making sense but not making sense. That I wasn’t going crazy was a relief, but it was such a shock to my system that I’d apparently fallen for a man. I hadn’t seen that part coming, and my family sure as hell hadn’t dropped any hints that they’d known. Had they known? Or had I hidden him away completely? But Ollie said he spoke with my mother, that she’d come to him recently, which led me to believe she knew something. She had to. Had she approved? Had my father? God, this is too surreal for words, I thought as I put my head in my hands.

And then there’d been the memories of the time I’d spent with Ollie. They were no longer showing up as just bits of platonic scenes, but as part of something deeper, a relationship that hadn’t at all been one-sided. If anything, it was almost as if I’d been the one to pursue him, which at first made me wonder how hard I’d hit my head, but the more I thought about it, the more I could almost begin to understand the appeal. After all, in my interactions with him since the day he’d walked into my classroom had proven that he was a caretaker at heart, someone who could be depended on in a crisis or even day to day. He didn’t take himself too seriously, as his piano skills and self-deprecating jokes showed, and there was something just good about him. Not to mention his arms were something out of Men’s Muscle magazine. And I guess if you lined up a hundred guys, he’d be the best-looking one out of the bunch, not that I’d ever noticed a guy’s looks before. All in all, looking at it objectively—which meant when I wasn’t downing a Crown and Coke—he could be considered a catch for anyone. Anyone in the world, and somehow he’d chosen me. Or I’d chosen him.

Ollie…and me. Together. Like…together together. Fuck.

Oh, and I couldn’t forget that he’d lied. Lied by omission, which was still lying. Coming around, getting to know me as if we were strangers, when the whole time he knew exactly how to play me. Showing up at the Music Junction had to have been my mother’s idea, because Ollie wouldn’t have known about my last-minute fill-in otherwise. Which meant he also knew I didn’t drive and would need a ride. But he knew exactly how to help you when you came across the accident and panicked the hell out.

“Shut up,” I said. “Just shut up.”

Ripping off the sheet, I tumbled out of the bed and filled a glass with water. I chugged the entire thing down in one go and then wiped the sweat off my forehead. I had to stop obsessing over this, or I was going to go crazy. If I hadn’t already.

An insistent knock sounded at my front door. I hadn’t ordered more food, and no one had called at the gate, which meant it could only be one of two people, and I wasn’t in the mood for lectures.

I swung open the door and leaned against it as my mom lowered her arm. Even on a Saturday in the middle of summer, she looked the part of a prim school teacher: a pale yellow skirt that fell to her knees and a simple white blouse with pearls. No need for the matching jacket in this heat.

“What are you doing here?” I said.

“You haven’t answered my calls or returned messages. I needed to make sure you were alive in here.” She lifted an eyebrow as her assessing gaze took in my bare chest and boxer briefs and what I knew had to be disheveled hair, since I hadn’t brushed it in three days. “You look awful.”

“Thank you. I’ve been better.” I scratched the stubble on my jaw, which wasn’t quite as prickly now, given that I hadn’t bothered with a razor lately either.

Her smile was hesitant. “May I come in?”

I held the door open, and she walked inside, looking around at the discarded pizza boxes and plates on the counter, and the almost-empty bottle of Crown.

“Good to see you’ve been staying hydrated,” she said wryly as she eyed the liquor and continued on to the living room while I grabbed a shirt and shorts from my room and threw them on. I let her comment pass, not caring one way or another if she knew I’d been self-medicating. She placed her purse on the coffee table and cleared off a space to sit, folding the rumpled blanket neatly before placing it over the back of the couch.

“Make yourself at home,” I said, flopping on the other sofa and rubbing my eyes.

“Do you mind telling me what’s going on with you, Reid?”

“Actually, I do mind.”

“It wasn’t a suggestion.”

I sat up and crossed my arms over my chest. “Weeell, what isn’t going on with me nowadays? Hmm. For starters, I don’t remember the last time I played the piano, and I’m really feeling the need to bang on some keys right about now.”

“Then why don’t you?”

With my eyebrows raised, I looked around the room. “You see one anywhere?”

“No, but—”

“Is there one over at your place I’ve somehow missed on my visits?”

“Oh. Well, no—”

“That’s right,” I said, slapping my knee. “Because you and Dad got rid of the piano.” God, I sounded like an asshole, but I couldn’t stop myself. If I had to be miserable, so did every-fucking-one else. They were all goin’ down with me. “Huh. Now why would you do a thing like that?”

Mom blinked at me like I’d lost my mind, and then her small shoulders lifted. “From what I remember, you moved out, and your father wanted room for his desk.”

“Ahh. And when you chose this place, did you know about the noise ordinance before or after?”

“What do you mean?”

“My piano, Mom. You know, my passion, my life. The thing I love that I conveniently can’t have here?”

“What?” she said. “Do you think we chose this place to keep you from playing?”

“I don’t know. Did you?”

“That’s ridiculous. How could you think I’d take away something so important to you? Do you really think I’m that malicious?”

“I wouldn’t have thought so, no. But I can’t help but wonder. I mean, you guys never agreed with my career; you wanted me back here near you and following in your line of work. Maybe you thought I’d forget.”

“I wasn’t even thinking, Reid. Your father and I thought this would be a nice place for you, gated and with great views. I promise it didn’t even cross my mind that you couldn’t bring your piano along. And then with you teaching music at the school and having access to several there… I’m so sorry. It honestly didn’t cross my mind.”

I could only stare at her, the woman who had been my rock for my whole life. The woman who would do anything for anyone and didn’t have a mean bone in her body. I knew she hadn’t intended to hurt me. I knew it’d been an accident, but I still felt the need to blame someone for all the fuck-ups happening in my life. And truthfully, now that I’d said my piece, I found the anger dissipating like early morning fog, and in its place—the guilt from lashing out. God, I’d been such an ass lately. What’s wrong with me?

Sighing, I ran a hand over my hair. “I know, Mom. I don’t mean to take out my frustration on you.”

“Oh, Reid,” she said, scooting to the edge of the couch to rub my arm. “I don’t pretend to know what’s happening to you right now. I know you’re confused and upset and taking it out on those closest to you. I know that, and I can handle it. So if you need to vent and yell, I understand. If you want to talk, I’m here. If you have questions, I’ll try to help you answer them as best I can. Things will get easier, baby. Please believe that.”

I wanted to believe she was telling the truth, that she was all-powerful and could see months and years into the future to know it would all turn out okay.

“If you’d like, why don’t you get dressed and we can run down to Newton’s now and pick out a new piano? The desk has become nothing but a clutter magnet anyway.” She squeezed my arm. “I’m so sorry, Reid. I just assumed since Ollie bought one for you to play, that you’d—”

I flinched and pulled away from her. “He did what?”

She seemed to realize her mistake as soon as she said it. “Oh. Oh dear.”

“He bought me a piano?”

“Well, I…I didn’t realize he had until recently, and—” She stopped and then said a word I hadn’t heard come out of her mouth ever: “Shit.”

My eyes widened. “Did you just say…‘shit’?”

“No,” she said, the look on her face a mixture of mortification and embarrassment. “Of course not.”

A snort of laughter left me then, because holy fuck—my proper, kind mother had cursed, which meant hell must’ve frozen over.

“It’s not funny,” she said, covering her face when I laughed harder. “Don’t tell your father.”

“It’s just a word, Mom. I don’t think it means you’ve cursed your soul for all eternity.” As she continued to shake her head, I rolled the words she’d uttered around in my head. I just assumed since Ollie bought one for you to play…

He bought me a piano?

“Did you…” I started.

“Yes?”

“Did you know about me and…Ollie?”

She looked me in the eye and said, “We never talked about it, but I knew.”

“How?”

“Call it mother’s intuition. You spent a lot of time with him after your accident. You told me he was someone who felt familiar to you, and…I noticed you smiled a lot more when he was in the picture.”

I swore my heart skipped a few beats as I listened to what she was telling me. She knew. She’d known. And somehow, she wasn’t judging me at all. My world tilted on its axis.

“Did Dad know?” I asked.

“It doesn’t matter—”

“Did Dad know, Mom?”

“No. No, I never said anything.”

“Why?”

“Because it wasn’t important,” she said firmly. “You were happy. That’s all that ever matters. That you’re safe and you’re happy.”

“But—”

“No buts, Reid. Why do you think I went to Ollie to help you? It was because I’ve never seen you happier in your entire life than you were in those few weeks. I didn’t need confirmation or details to know what had changed.”

My mouth opened and shut a few times as I processed what she was saying. I’d been happy? Not only happy, but happier than I’d ever been in my life? With Ollie? I thought about the memory from this morning, how the words I love you had been on the tip of my tongue, the feeling so strong that it almost overwhelmed me. And the memory I’d awoken to yesterday, when he’d taken me to a place that looked like something out of The Wizard of Oz, and I’d had a strong feeling of an entirely different sort.

“You’re saying you were okay with me being…being…” I gripped the back of my neck and looked up at the ceiling, as if that would have the answers I was looking for.

“With a man?” Mom said, and my eyes met hers again. There was such love and acceptance in her gaze, and it made my heart constrict. “But Ollie’s not just any man, is he?”

I swallowed past the lump in my throat.

“He never left that waiting room after your surgery. Even when you woke up and had no idea who he was. He waited, and I don’t think he ever gave up hope that you’d find your way back to him. Then you came home, and he called every single day to check on you. For over a month, like clockwork, until the doctor told us it was likely you may never remember the weeks you lost. At the time, I thought maybe it was best to focus on what was familiar to you. Surround you with the people you knew and loved before your accident.” She shook her head. “But I was wrong to make him stay away. I take full responsibility for my actions, and I’ve apologized to Ollie too.”

My breaths came out shallow as I rested my head in my hands, trying to combine the worlds that warred in my brain. “I don’t understand how this happened.”

“Sometimes life takes unexpected turns and gives you a good wallop on the head to make you see things clearly—Oh, I didn’t mean your accident, good grief. That was a bad choice of words.”

I chuckled softly. “No offense taken.”

“How do you feel? Things are coming back to you now?”

“Mom, I… I don’t know how to feel.” I twisted my fingers together as I searched for what to say. “I thought I was going crazy. I thought I was having hallucinations, honest to God. I had no idea I was remembering things that really happened. And now that I know?” I shook my head. “I’m even more lost than I was before.”

“Oh, baby,” she said, and moved over to the couch beside me, holding me close as I held on to her like a life preserver. “I wish I could help you make sense of things. I wish I could make it easy.”

“I can’t decide if it’s a good or bad thing to remember,” I said, my voice muffled in her shirt.

“It doesn’t have to be one or the other. This isn’t something you have to rush to understand overnight. You have all the time in the world to figure out how you want to live your life and who the people are that you want in it.”

“Do I?” I asked, straightening. “Have all the time in the world now?” I found that hard to believe after everything I’d gone through this year.

“Yes. I believe you really do. I think you’ve been given a fresh start. But don’t keep carrying around all this heavy weight and guilt. Don’t drown your mind in alcohol and shut yourself away in here. That’s not you, and that’s never been you.”

My gaze drifted over to the littered countertop. “I know. You’re right.”

“And hey? If you want a piano, we’ll get one. If you decide teaching isn’t for you and you want to try something else, then do it. I won’t try to know what’s best for you anymore, Reid, because I’m getting it wrong at every turn. Only you can figure out what you need to make you happy.”

I hadn’t realized how much I needed to hear those words from her, but they soothed some of the ache in my soul that had been taking a beating since I’d moved back to Floyd Hills, a failure with my tail between my legs. I wasn’t the same man I’d been then, only a year ago—but the problem was that I had no idea who the hell I was now. Staying in my apartment for three days hadn’t given me any answers, and it never would.

“Mom, I…I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now,” I admitted. “About Ollie.”

She brushed my hair off my forehead in a tender gesture. “I know you’re confused. I know this doesn’t make sense to you. And I know that Ollie expects nothing from you. He’s not that kind of person. Whether you can find the connection the two of you once shared is entirely up to you, but no matter what, I know that man will be there for you regardless of what you decide. He could be the best friend you’ll ever have.” When she blinked, a tear fell down her cheek, and she smiled at me and cupped my face. “And I think you need that, Reid. I really do.”