Though he remembered what he was like as a teenager, and had he allowed himself to fully realize his desperate attraction to Theo Beaumont he probably would have sought out professional help.

“Yeah.”

“I think you should be careful, though.”

She was always so concerned for him. He smiled back at her.

“If I’ve got the story right... I think you may have hurt him. Badly.”

Or not.

He slumped. “Yeah. I know.”

“Oh, Jack.” She stood from the bench, came up behind him, and put her steady hands on his shoulders, standing on tiptoe. “You’re going to get it right, someday.”

He laughed a little. “I hope that day is really soon.”

“Well...” She brushed her hands down his shoulders, smoothing out a few wrinkles as she went. “You should get this outfit, for a start. Though I think you need a little—”

She grabbed a scarf—a purple paisley, great—and arranged it around his neck. “There.”

“You must be joking.”

“Maybe I am.” She patted his chest. “Maybe it’s a little revenge.” Her eyes sparkled with mischief.

He watched himself in the mirror. He could almost see that sixteen-year-old boy who climbed his first tree hiding behind his eyes.

He bought everything Meg had picked out. Even the scarf.

He knew he would never wear it, but—

It was nice. To have people who cared for him.

He hoped he had the capacity to truly care back.

This was a terrible idea.

Truth be told, he had in his life possessed many terrible ideas. Sometimes he felt like going to Gwynns was his worst ever, even though it had led to so much good. He was still, even now, an alien in that world, and he wondered if he’d ever feel like he was—

And so much of the way he’d behaved was terrible, rejecting people—and going to Pride in June, and suggesting to Meg that they sneak up to the bell tower, and following Theo into the locker room when—

But this—his idea to follow Theo yet again, in a foreign country, no less—was completely, definitely, and staggeringly terrible.

Jack leaned up against the brick building around the corner from where he’d watched Theo duck into a closed club. His heart was racing and his hands were sweaty. He rubbed his dry eyes, still sandy from the few snatches of sleep he caught on the train.

It was a miracle that he’d found Theo at all.