Chapter 6
Chapter six
“Imean it,” Sergio says, looking directly at Jeremy on the ice and ignoring Holden’s smirk beside him. “You look good.”
Jeremy dips his head and turns away, but the faint blush of his cheeks doesn’t sneak past Sergio. “Thanks,” he says. “I’m really only out here playing around. I shouldn’t even be on the ice.”
“No,” Sergio protests, wanting to see his face again.
“I think the ice is exactly where you belong.” Then, remembering the disaster from yesterday, he resists the urge to reach over the half wall and touch Jeremy, even though he wants nothing more than to feel Jeremy underneath his fingertips.
To run his hands down Jeremy’s soft sweatshirt and enjoy the resistance of his toned muscle structure beneath his palms. “Come here.”
Jeremy looks over his shoulder at Sergio as he begins to skate away. “I’m not your dog. You can’t just beckon me to you and expect me to come because you said something nice.”
Sergio’s mouth drops open. “That’s … that’s not what I was trying to do at all.” He shakes his head and looks at Holden for help. Useless. He’s barely stifling a laugh. “I was going to try to apologize.”
Jeremy stops near Henry and grabs his blade guards off the half wall. “Sergio, I don’t have time for this right now.” He slips a guard onto one skate and takes his attention to Holden as he steps off the ice. “What time are we leaving tonight?”
“A little before eight,” Holden says. “We gotta drop Henry off at the Weirs’ on the way.”
“Alright. I’ll meet you up at the house in a bit, then.
” He slides a blade guard onto his right skate before he steps completely off the ice, avoiding Sergio’s attempt to make eye contact.
Once seated, he keeps his head down and focuses on unlacing his skates, making it clear he’s done having Sergio as part of his audience.
“We’ll see you later, Jeremy,” Holden calls after him as he lifts Henry off the ground and places him on his shoulders.
“Yeah, we’ll see you later,” Sergio says, thankful this time that he at least didn’t knock Jeremy over.
“I think the ice is exactly where you belong,” Sergio says with twice as much sincerity.
There’s no denying it. After catching yet another glimpse of Jeremy’s skating and seeing that blush redden his cheeks at the slightest compliment, nothing has ever been clearer.
To Sergio, getting Jeremy to see that is the most important thing to him, second only to apologizing.
Jeremy moves away from him, heading to where he can collect his things and get off the ice. Sergio pushes past Holden, practically knocking him over in his haste to catch Jeremy before he can put his first blade guard on.
“What the hell?” Holden laughs.
Sergio flashes him an annoyed look, then turns his attention back to Jeremy. “Listen, Jeremy. Can you give me a second? I want to apologize.”
Jeremy pauses and gives a pointed nod in Henry’s direction, then another one at Holden before staring at Sergio. “Now really isn’t the best time.”
“There is no better time. I should know. I’ve been trying to do this for days now.”
“Days?” Jeremy’s face scrunches up in confusion. “You just got here.”
Fuck. Sergio swallows. “I meant all day.”
“It’s fine, Sergio.”
It feels anything but fine.
Jeremy turns his attention to Holden. “What time are we leaving tonight?”
Sitting beside his brother in the back of Holden’s Range Rover, Sergio replays yesterday's disaster apology attempt to Jeremy in his head. He has to try something new.
“Can you grab Henry from Jeremy?” Rose asks Holden when they pull into the garage after yet another day on the slopes. “I need to get cleaned up and start getting ready for tonight.”
“Sure thing,” Holden says, then turns to look at Sergio and Adrien in the back seat. “Do either of you want to come with? Maybe Jeremy has Henry up and on skates. You should see him. He’s terrible.”
“Yeah, I’ll come.” Sergio nods.
“Adrien?”
“Nah. It’s almost midnight in Paris. I’m gonna call Daphne and wish her a Happy New Year.”
“Alright, send her our love,” Holden says and exits the car.
“Actually, do you mind if I go do it? Alone?” Sergio asks Holden, following him towards the garage exit.
“Sure.” Holden shrugs and turns around. “It’s your funeral.”
Rose stops in her tracks on the garage steps leading into the house. She looks at Sergio skeptically. Her eyes narrowed in. “Why do you need to go alone?”
“I’d like to apologize to Jeremy,” Sergio says with urgency. He figured out yesterday that having Holden there doesn’t help. He doesn’t need Rose standing in his way, either. He raises an eyebrow at her in challenge. “And I don’t need a chaperone.”
“Fine,” she relents, opening the door and stepping through. Over her shoulder, she calls out, “But I swear to God, Sergio, if you hurt him again, I will kick you in the nuts.”
Under his breath, Sergio says, “Don’t worry, your son’s already done that multiple times for you.”
“What was that?” Holden asks.
“Nothing,” Sergio says as he exits the garage in the opposite direction and heads towards the barn. The entire way there, he reminds himself to stay calm and not to make any movements that might lead to Jeremy falling or comments that might cause Jeremy to shut down.
Pulling the door open, he hears the familiar crooning of Chris Isaak.
Despite his nerves, the song pulls a sense of calm and comfort over him like a blanket.
Even through its haunting and cut-throat lyrics, which are accurate to his predicament, he’s beginning to crave the song.
Then, same as he’s done the other times he’s walked in on this sight, Sergio pauses at the rink's wall and watches the way Jeremy moves. It’s beautiful in its simplicity.
Taking a deep breath, he slowly makes his way over to where Henry is sitting, watching Jeremy glide around the ice.
Not wanting to startle him or pull Jeremy’s attention away from his skating, which he is obviously enjoying, Sergio stays quiet.
Once he reaches Henry, he carefully sits beside him and pulls him into his lap.
He rests his chin on Henry’s head. “He’s great out there, isn’t he? ”
“The best,” Henry says, then looks up at Sergio to amend, “After mommy.”
Sergio lets out a soft laugh and whispers, “Yeah, after Mommy. Of course.”
Jeremy’s skating has taken him closer to where Sergio and Henry are sitting and when he loops around in his choreography, he slows in his tracks, gracefully dropping his arms to his sides and coming to a stop a few feet away, blushing. “I thought Henry was my only audience.”
“Sorry,” Sergio says, realizing now he could be seen as an interloper. “I snuck in. I didn’t want to disturb you. You look good out there.”
“Don’t tease,” Jeremy scolds.
“I wasn’t teasing.”
Jeremy bites at his lip, looking like he doesn’t believe him and like he wants to change the subject to anything besides talking about himself. “Where’s Holden? I figured he’d grab Henry.”
“I told him I wanted to do it instead.”
“Well, I won’t hold you up,” Jeremy says as he steadies himself against the low rink wall and slips a blade guard on one skate, then steps off and does the same with his other before he begins to walk away.
With Henry still in his arms, Sergio awkwardly rises and steps to catch up with Jeremy. “Actually, I wanted to talk to you.”
Jeremy pauses and looks over his shoulder. “Really?”
“Yeah. About last night.”
Jeremy turns away again. “Don’t worry about it. It’s fine.”
Sergio grips Henry a little tighter with one arm, then reaches for Jeremy with the other. “It’s not fine. It was insensitive, and I shouldn't have said it.”
Jeremy’s shoulders creep up towards his ears as he turns to face Sergio again. “It’s not like you knew.”
“No, but I should have,” he says, and he means it. Any decent human being would have continued to follow their love interest’s story even after they had asked them to put their mutual interest on hold, no matter how briefly.
“Why?” Jeremy asks sincerely, tugging at his left eye in his familiar way.
“Would it have made a difference anyway? Would you have come to my hospital bedside and held my hand after I collapsed from that migraine? Would you have helped me stand up when I woke up from it, and my right foot no longer worked as it was supposed to, and my back ached and refused to straighten with ease, making me hunch like a rigid old man? When I was released from the hospital and shipped back to the States, would you have taken me to endless physical therapy appointments and rehab only so I could function as a shadow of myself?”
He tugs at his eye again, and Sergio grabs his hand and cradles it in his own. “Why do you do that?” he asks gently.
“Because I can’t always see out of it,” Jeremy snaps and pulls his hand back.
Henry, always intuitive, reaches for Jeremy in Sergio’s arms. Jeremy smiles at him and ruffles his hair. “Listen, I gotta rest up,” he says. “It’s gonna be a long night. Do you know what time we’re leaving?”
“A little before eight,” Sergio says, feeling worse than he had before he tried to apologize. “We gotta drop Henry off at the Weirs’ on the way.”
“Alright.” Jeremy nods. “I’ll meet everyone up at the house in a bit.” He turns on his heel and walks away, presumably to take his skates off and head up to his little apartment in the barn.
“Well, that went horribly,” Sergio mutters as he watches Jeremy go.
Henry shrugs and looks at him. “You tried.”
“Yeah, kid. I did try.” But not nearly hard enough. Thankfully, there’s always tomorrow.
Spotting Sergio sitting on the rink’s ledge with Henry on his lap, Jeremy slows in his tracks, gracefully dropping his arms to his sides, and comes to a stop a few feet away, blushing. “I thought Henry was my only audience.”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude,” Sergio says and places his best smile on his face, reminding himself to get it right this time.