In Another Life

Eleven

Even though Mitch knew that Scott was home, he still ended up flinching at the sudden sound of his voice. He spun around to look at him, opening his mouth to say yes.

But the second his eyes landed on Scott's face he ended up changing his mind. "Not really," he admitted.

Scott of course frowned right away at the news. "What's wrong?" he asked, sitting up on his bed.

Mitch didn't know where to start. But eventually he ended up blurting something out. "Do you think that two months is too early to be in love with someone?"

Mitch could tell that Scott wasn't expecting that question at all. "Why? Are you in love with Blake?"

"Blake is in love with me," Mitch told him. "And I said it back, but I'm not sure if that's actually how I feel."

Scott nodded his head slowly. "Well. It is possible. I fell in love with Lucas pretty quickly – probably within about two months."

"And it didn't turn out very well, did it," Mitch pointed out.

"No," Scott agreed. He paused, and then spoke up again. "Have you ever been in love before?"

Mitch stared at Scott silently for a long moment as he debated whether he wanted to answer that question truthfully or not. After a while, he finally gave him his answer. "Yeah," he admitted softly, "I have been."

Scott took a visible deep breath. "Does the way you feel about Blake compare to how you felt about that guy?" he asked.

Mitch shook his head. "Not at all."

There was no comparison. Blake had never come close to making Mitch feel the way that he felt for Scott.

"Then it's probably not love yet," Scott concluded, confirming what Mitch unfortunately was already beginning to suspect himself. "But it's still early, if he's really special to you then those feelings will come in time. You just have to wait."

Mitch bit his lip. "That's the thing, though. I don't know if I should wait," he told him.

Scott seemed surprised by Mitch's words. "Why not?"

"Because I know how much you hate him," Mitch answered. "You don't have to lie about it, Scott. It's fine," he added in quickly, knowing he was going to try to protest. "You obviously can't stand him. And I don't want to stick around long enough for me to really fall in love with him if it would make you unhappy."

"Mitch. You can't let me dictate what you do with your love life. That's not fair to you at all," Scott told him. "You're right, I don't like Blake very much. But he makes you happy and that's all that matters."

Mitch bit his lip again. "But there must be a reason that you hate him so much," he brought up. "Is it worthy of me breaking up with him?"

Scott almost looked like he was in pain as he answered. "No," he admitted. "There's nothing that you don't know about. I just get a bad feeling whenever I'm around him, that's all."

"Are you sure?" Mitch asked. "I really don't want to make you unhappy, Scott."

"I'm sure, Mitch," Scott confirmed. "It's okay. I promise. Like I said when you first started texting him, I'm happy as long as you are."

Mitch instantly felt comforted by his words. Scott's hatred for Blake really must not be as intense as Blake was trying to make it seem.

He could continue to date him without guilt.

"Okay," Mitch replied softly. "Thanks, Scott. You mean the world to me, I hope you now that."

Scott smiled. "You mean the world to me too, Mitchy."