Quiet and imaginative, Derek O'Reilly spends a lot of time watching a movie in his head. His fiancé Nathan wonders why Derek hasn't taken any interest in their wedding planning, and Aunt Fran -- his spiritual guru -- would like to know when her guilt-tripping nephew became a kept boy. When she drops Derek's childhood journal on his lap, he's forced to remember the name he's been trying to forget since he was twelve years old. Nicolai Lund. Nick was Derek's neighbor ... and first love. Weeks before Derek's engagement party, a chance meeting with Nick catapults Derek into the past. But Nick isn't that seventeen-year-old rebel anymore. He's a man hardened by invisible scars. A man struggling with grief. As Derek reads through his childhood diary, he realizes what Nick was to him, still is today, and yet might be ... NOTE: This edition has been expanded and substantially edited.

Split

And so many more I wished to teach her sometimes cynical heart.


Why? What had I done, but sink into my own troubled waters?


“Do you remember the man—” her voice was barely a whisper, but she pressed on, “—the man at the Dragon Hair counter, that day I took you to the Chinese district?”


I remembered. The taste of sugar and oil filled my mouth, and I could almost smell the roasted peanuts.


“My beautiful boy, you are an enchanter.” Aunt Fran held her fingers out and I cupped them, letting the moment drown my mind in sorrow. “You’ve remained untouched by the ugly. You of all people, should have been bitter and angry, but you never were. You were always ready to forgive and forget. And you always believed in love, with barely any proof of its existence.” She closed her eyes. “You’ve blessed my life, Derek O’Reilly. I wish you could have been my son.”


Chapter 69