Avi was glad that Kevin and Kirstie took him home. He was tired and surprisingly drifted off the second Kevin had started his car. There still was a lot on his mind, but he simply was too tired to care, at least for the moment.
"Avi? Avi come on, there is no way I can carry you inside."
"Oh, you could if you wanted to. He is tiny and you're buff."
Avi woke up to the soft banter of his best friends and was surprised to see that they were already at his place. "Oh... was traffic that light?"
"Oh hell no, there was an accident, we almost needed an hour to get here" Kirstie commented.
"You really needed this nap, Avi. How are you feeling?" Kevin asked as Avi stretched his arms and got out of the car.
"Better. Still feel like I need a full night's sleep to be back at it, but okay for now" Avi said. "Still lost, though. I don't get why he acted that way when all I wanted was to support him."
"No one knows, Avi" Kirstie said. "But he is with Mich now and Mitch will find out whatever is wrong with him."
"She's right" Kevin chimed in when Avi wanted to say something. "You should take care of yourself today, even though it's hard. But if you want to continue to support Scott, you need to be healthy and rested."
"True..." Avi returned. "I'll probably head to bed after some food. Do you want to join? Pizza is on me. I probably won't be the best company, but..."
Kirstie smiled. "Of course we want to join, right, Kevin?"
"Yes," Kevin replied and followed Avi inside the house. "I would never decline pizza, especially because the place where you order is so good."
Avi chuckled. "I told you that you should move out here. Seriously, it's so calm, close to nature, just perfect for someone who just got married and might or might not be a father, soon."
"True..." Kevin shrugged his shoulders. "And we talked about moving once more to a place where we can live as a family, but we'll see about it."
Avi was glad that they had found a topic that wasn't related to his issues with Scott. He didn't want to sulk, he just wanted his pizza a nice cup of tea and then his bed. Of course, he was still worried about his boyfriend, but Kirstie and Kevin were right, Mitch was handling everything and while he was planning on keeping his phone near him, he was almost sure that nothing else would happen on this day.
~
After having a pizza and some idle talk, Kirstie and Kevin said their goodbyes. They told him to keep his head up and both hugged him tightly.
Then he had a mug of tea and wrote some things down in his journal. He had started one, too, after he realised how effective it was for Scott. He didn't write in it every single night, but it helped him to sort out his thoughts and get him ready for bed.
The last thing he did before falling asleep was to check his phone for any news of Scott and indeed there was a new message from Mitch:
"Hi, Avi. I hope you're doing somewhat okay. Just wanted to let you know that I got through to him. There's a lot on his mind, but he knows that he fucked up big time. Everything else is for tomorrow, I decided that you both need to sleep before tackling all this. If you need anything, please call me, I'm staying with Scott for the night. Take care and please try to sleep. Oh and I talked to Kevin and Kirstie, we're skipping the studio day tomorrow. Good night, Avi. Mitch."
Avi smiled when he read the message. Mitch had made sure that he knew what was going on and he was sure that he would be able to sleep okay that night.
"Hi Mitch, thank you so much for the message. I'm doing fine now that I read this. I had dinner and will now head to bed. I really want to talk to Scott, but you're right, I need to sleep. But I'm looking forward to seeing him again tomorrow. Take care of yourself, too and sleep tight."
After sending the message, Avi got ready for bed and turned on a story to help him fall asleep. He drifted off within minutes.
~
After a fresh shower and breakfast cooked by Mitch the next morning, Scott got ready to leave to visit Avi. He had texted him to make sure he was up and ready to meet and stopped at a florist on his way to pick up some flowers for him.
He looked around, searching for something Avi could like when a middle-aged woman came to him. "Good morning, can I help you?"
"Good morning, I need some flowers for my boyfriend," he said.
"Okay. Roses? I got a fresh delivery of really beautiful dark red roses in today" the florist offered.
Scott grimaced. "No. No roses. We don't like them."
"Fair enough. They're nice but also very cliché. What do you have in mind?"
"His favourite flowers are dahlias. So maybe something like this?" Scott asked.
"Oh, dahlias. Very colourful. I have some here. Do you have any special colours you want?" The florist walked over to a display of colourful flowers.
Scott looked at them and was overwhelmed. "Errm, no? They're all beautiful."
"They sure are," the florist said and turned around. She took a bunch of flowers and quickly bunched them together. "Like this? Or more colour."
In the end, Scott spent ten more minutes choosing dahlias for the huge bouquet he carried up to Avi's front door half an hour later. He was nervous, even though Mitch had ensured him that everything would be just fine. But he knew that he had messed up and he would understand if Avi would just send him away.
Once he had rung the doorbell, he only had to wait a few seconds until Avi opened the door.
"Hi, Scott," the bearded man said with a soft smile on his face. "Come in."
"Hi, Avi" Scott replied and help out the bouquet. "These are for you."
Avi gasped. "Oh my, they're beautiful. Thank you. But you didn't have to."
Scott shook his head. "No, I had to. It's the least I can do. I'm sorry. I don't know what went into me yesterday but what I said was unfair and just wrong."
"It was unfair, yes, and you really hurt me, Scott. But I accept your apology" Avi returned.
Scott smiled slightly. "Thank you," he said.
Avi placed the flowers on a sideboard and opened his arms. "Hug?"
Scott pulled his boyfriend in and held him tight. "Missed you so much," he said. "I shouldn't have pushed you away."
"We're here now, Scott. That's all that matters" Avi replied. He was comfortable with his head against Scott's broad chest. He belonged there.
And Scott noticed that Avi needed to be held and he gladly did so with his left arm while his right hand softly ran up and down his boyfriend's back. "I love you, Avi," he said softly.
"I love you too, Scott."
~~~~
