Page 91 of Give Me What You Will

“It’s hard to be vulnerable,” Frankie murmured. The weight of his gaze was on him, but Sam kept his eyes averted. “Especially when you don’t know how the other person will react.”

He inhaled slowly, focusing on the story. “They weren’t in the same platoon. So Papi wrote Jack a letter, thinking it would be easier than being rejected in person.”

Sam picked up the letter from the box, recognizing it like the back of his hand. He had read it countless times over the years, wishing he had half the courage his grandpa did.

He carefully pulled it out of the envelope and studied the slanted, looping cursive words of his grandpa, feeling him in this moment.

“Read it to me,” Frankie said softly.

With a tremulous breath, he nodded.

“Dear Jack, I know I’ll see you in a couple of weeks at the next rendezvous point, but I don’t think I can wait any longer. I saw a friend of mine step on a land mine today and, well, he didn’t wait to say goodbye. I realized that life goes by in a blink. It’s a step onto a landmine. It’s fast and brutal and leaves none of us alive. This place has changed what I thought life was supposed to be. I’m not the same boy you knew. And neither are you. War leaves a fingerprint on every soul it touches. But I somehow knew I would be okay because you were with me. You are the reason I am fighting every day to stay alive. I want you, Jack. I want to hold you. Kiss you. Love you…”

Sam sucked in a breath, not sure if he could continue, but knowing he couldn’t stop. “I love you. I’ve always loved you. Fate made us best friends. And on some of my darker days, I don’t know if it was out of cruelty or love. I can’t be your best friend anymore, Jack—I love you too damn much to settle for only that. If you don’t feel the same, I’ll understand. You don’t have to say anything, and I won’t either. But if you read this and you do love me back—the next time you see me—don’t say anything. Not here. Not in this place. Tell me when we get back home. With all my love, your Papi.”

He folded the letter carefully back into the envelope and placed it with the rest of Papi and Jack’s love story, his heart beating out of his chest as he confessed the words he wished he could say to Frankie through his grandpa.

Sam felt the tension in the room between them and kept his eyes locked on the box, on the photos, on the past, too scared to turn and look at the man he loved.

“You know,” Frankie said after the longest minute of his life. “I couldn’t help but notice—you look like him.”

Frankie leaned forward, retrieved a picture from the box, and handed it to him. It wasn’t Papi. It was Jack. He was young, in his early twenties, wearing swim trunks and sunglasses and the biggest smile as he sat at the edge of the pool, his legs in the water. He had the same build as Sam. The same messy top curls, loose and wild. The same dimple on his chin and classic, handsome features. He understood why Frankie called him Superman.

“Papi wasn’t my biological grandfather, Jack was,” Sam replied thickly, marveling at the similarities in the photo.

Frankie’s eyebrows lifted in surprise, and he nodded. He then pulled out another old photo from the box and showed it to him. “I get why Papi liked me so much, then. We have the same nose.”

He glanced over the photo, and everything in him stilled. Papi could’ve been a Casavani, with those similar Italian characteristics: olive-tanned skin, dark black hair, and a thick, broad nose. Papi was straddling a motorcycle, a leather jacket on, looking young and fresh-faced, and smirking coolly at the camera. Papi had spent so much time in Frankie’s garage, always talking about cars and motorcycles. They always got along so well. Both strong, protective, loyal men.

He stared and blinked, stunned. “How come I never noticed this before?” He said mostly to himself rather than Frankie.

“Sometimes we don’t see what’s right in front of us until we decide to look. You’ve taught me that.”

He finally looked at him, and Frankie was smiling. It was soft and affectionate, and he was so fucking handsome. He sighed.

“What happened next?” Frankie asked, reaching for him, his finger tracing lightly over his cheek and through his hair.

“They met at basecamp a few weeks later and…” He released the breath that had been sitting on his chest like a boulder. “Jack did what Papi asked. He didn’t tell him that he loved him, but they did—other stuff. He wanted Papi to know that he was his.”

“Yeah, I bet he did.”

Sam smirked, trying to release the tension building up in his body, but he couldn’t. The parallels between Papi and Jack with him and Frankie were similar, yet not. “I couldn’t imagine being at war, not knowing if the man I loved would be alive the next day without telling him the truth.”

Frankie sighed, fingers swirling over his neck, oddly silent.

“Though,” he heard himself continue, a nervous energy racing through him. “I suppose a lot can be said without words.”

“They were best friends for years,” Frankie replied. “They knew.”

“They had only been friends for a few years…” Sam stopped short, panic itching up his neck and wondering if Frankie suspected his feelings.

He had to know.

Oh God.

Mortified, Sam buried his face in his hands, desperately wanting to disappear. Vanish. Anything but to see the pity reflected in Frankie’s gaze.

“Baby, baby, baby,” Frankie whispered frantically and was on him in that instant, hushing him, touching him, kissing his temple, his hair, his cheeks. “It’s okay. It’s okay.”