By the time we emerged from Lena's room, hiding in hoodies and pulling oily hair up, Matt was up and making pancakes. It was his usual go-to for hangovers, and I appreciated him greatly.

"There's mimosas too," he said, knowing the look on my face.

"I could kiss you."

He snickered while Lena groaned and draped herself across her counter. "Just orange juice. I think I'll puke if I smell alcohol."

"Hair of the dog, baby," Matt said, but he obediently passed her a glass of OJ followed by a plate of pancakes.

I wandered into the livingroom to kick at my brother, who was knocked out on the floor. He'd given Beatrice the couch, and she opened one eye at me before turning around. "I'll leave you here," I warned. Rick didn't reply, so I left him.

"What did you two do last night?" Matt asked, all dancing eyebrows as I walked back into the kitchen.

"Shove off," I told him, and he laughed as he handed me a plate and a mimosa.

"The others?" Lena asked, dragging her head up to stab miserably at a pancake. She hadn't even managed to put syrup on them.

"Lacey's in the shower," Matt said, "but Seb took Kaitlynn to the airport. Said he'd swing by later to help with clean up."

"What a saint," Lena muttered, and shoved half the pancake she'd mutilated in her mouth.

Matt smiled and sat across from us, drenching his own pancakes. He didn't look as bad as the rest of us apparently felt, but then again, Matt Alveraz had been keeping up with Scott since they were teenagers. He'd probably learned a few tricks.

"Did you and Lace bang in my living room?" Lena asked, and I was honestly kind of surprised to hear Matt and Lacey were still banging. Appalled, Matt placed a hand over his heart and leaned back like she'd actually hurt him. She rolled her eyes at him, "Or Scott and Lakyn's bed?"

"And find out they have hooks on their bed or something like that? No thanks," Matt said, and I snorted.

We nursed our hangovers in silence before Lacey joined us, combing product through her hair. She looked annoyingly fresh faced and put together, and ran her fingertips over Matt's bare back as she walked by him.

"Mornin' Lace," Lena mumbled.

Lacey shot her an amused look. "Afternoon," she corrected. "You guys look great."

"Better than Rick and Bea," I said with a nod towards the living room, where the couple was still passed out.

Lacey didn't answer me. Her dark eyes were heavy, and closed off in a way I hadn't recognized since the day we'd met, separated by a cafeteria table. Lena may have forgiven me for London, but Lacey hadn't.

Matt and Lacey were staying the night, but they had a hotel closer to the airport, and left around midday. Rick and Beatrice eventually dragged themselves out of bed, thanked Lena for her hospitality, and did the same. My dad likely had my stuff, but when the house was empty and it was obvious I was lingering, Lena turned to me.

"Do you want a shower?"

"Yes, please."

***

I'd been to Lena's place more than once over the years. Sometimes she'd been home, sometimes it'd just been me and the boys. My favorite part of their house was the far living room wall, that was decorated from ceiling to floor with photos of their lives. Snapshots, candids, bits and pieces of memories. I was in some, but not many, and it was the ones I wasn't in that I loved the most.

Fresh from her shower, Lena joined me, with two mugs of hot chocolate. She passed me one, and I took it with a grateful nod.

"Why did you and Sebastian break up?" I asked, and I wasn't entirely sure where the confidence to do so had come from. I didn't know much about Sebastian, I'd only ever spent time with him in fleeting moments, but I knew he'd been Lena's longest relationship, after me. Why hadn't they worked out.

Lena stared at me for a moment, but she wasn't thinking. She was looking for something. She took a sip of her drink and lowered herself to sit on the arm of her couch. "Why did you and Thea break up?"

Ah.

"Thea was lovely," I said, not taking my eyes from the photos. "And maybe a version of me that had never met you could have been happy with her. Could have given her the kind of future she deserves."

"It was a hard breakup," she pointed out. "I remember how long Lakyn spent with you."

Had we ever talked this openly in high school? With this candor where both of us knew if we didn't, there was no way to move on from this moment. I'd get on another plane, and maybe I wouldn't come back, but if I did, maybe all Lena and I would ever be was strangers. Even if she lived with Scott and Lakyn for the rest of her life.

Finally, I turned to her. "You didn't bring a date to the wedding."

"Neither did you," she pointed out.

Single, then. Both of us.

"It wasn't a hard break up," I said. "In fact, it was such an easy break up that I felt awful about it. What was hard was the reason we broke up."

"Sebastian and I were just friends," Lena said. "I think we always were. Just friends, helping each other through a rough time. And once we were all healed up, there was no reason to keep pretending like we were more."

I smiled sadly at her. Sebastian had been helping her through me, and maybe, in a way, Thea had been doing the same thing. "She wasn't you."

The words dropped the kind of bomb I'd been expecting, and I sat my mug on a side table before folding my arms and leaning a hip on it. Lena was staring at me, waiting, and I smiled again. "She was ready to be serious, settle down, and start a life together. And I could have done it, it would have been easy, but it would have been a lie. She wasn't you, and the only person I've ever wanted to share a life with was you."

"I was still with Seb," Lena said softly, "and you still left her."

I lifted a shoulder in a shrug. "Better to be alone than live a lie."

Lena's fingers moved anxiously around her mug. "So, what do we do now?"

"Start over?"

She rolled her eyes. "Start over?"

I shrugged again. "It's been six years, Len. You can't honestly tell me you're the same person."

"Maybe," she said, stubbornly. "Maybe not."

I snorted, and looked down at my feet. Her pajama shirt hung off of one of my shoulders, landing just above my thighs. I liked it. "Do you want to?"

"Want to what?"

"Start over," I said softly.

I heard her take a breath in, like she was getting ready to say something long winded and potentially heart breaking, but instead she just said, "You're still in London."

"Not for much longer," I answered.

"You're coming home?" she asked.

I looked up at her again. "I graduate in a couple of months. There's no reason to stay. I miss my family. I miss ... you."

"A couple of months," she repeated.

"Go back with me," I said, and watched as Lena's eyes nearly popped out of her head.

"I can't go to London for a couple of months."

I rolled my eyes at her. "Go back with me, stay a few weeks, then come home. When was the last time you took a vacation anyway?"

She shrugged, which didn't surprise me. I knew she visited Lacey on occasion, and home sometimes, but I couldn't recall the boys ever saying she was taking a vacation just for the hell of it.

I crossed the distance between us and wrapped my arms around her loosely. "Let me show you my London, and let's try this again."

"Okay," Lena said, as if she was ever going to say anything else, and pressed up to kiss me. She tasted like chocolate, and something familiar, and I'd had plenty of kisses throughout my life, but none of them had ever felt like hers.

***

Being with Lena again, after years apart, after existing in letters that were sent slower and slower, was surreal. She told me about school, and work, and the people she had met along the way. Lakyn's cat, Marie, curled into my lap, but Lena's, Church, was grumpier and liked new people less.

She was careful never to say 'strangers', even when it fit.

We talked about London, and Lacey's place in New York where she'd settled after school, and where we might want to end up one day. Grant wasn't for us, not after living in big cities, but maybe we'd settle somewhere in California.

"Do you want to live on your own?" I asked. I didn't say 'with or without me', because that wasn't what I was asking, and somehow she understood that.

"No, I don't think so," she said. "I like living with the boys, I think they keep me sane."

It was kind of amusing, just because of who Scott and Lakyn were, but I understood. The year Scott had lived with us had been one of the happiest in our home. It felt weird to be without them.

"I think I'll stay with them until they want to start a family," she said. "Or until they kick me out."

I laughed at the very idea and scratched Marie's neck, tilting my head on the couch to look at Lena. She was so beautiful. Somehow even more beautiful now than the day I'd met her - as if she'd grown into her beauty. Made it something of her own.

There were times that I couldn't believe we'd spent so many years apart, and times that I was glad we had. That we hadn't dragged each other through our growing pains just because we didn't want to let go. That in our haste to hold on, we hadn't hurt each other. Hadn't squeezed the life out of us.

I reached out to draw my fingers along the side of Lena's face, tuck her hair behind her ear, and she smiled at me. All this time, and yet it was still so easy to talk to her. It always had been.

"Do you remember when you asked me out?" I asked.

"I didn't ask," Lena said with a smile. "I demanded. And you just said 'okay'. As if ... you'd been expecting it."

It started out as a question, but turned into an accusation, and I couldn't help but smile. "Not expecting. Hoping, maybe."

"Lakyn knew," she said. "Scott, too. They caught me planning."

"You did put a lot of thought into that first date," I muttered.

"Your turn, now," Lena said. Her green eyes shined. "Woo me, Juliet James."

She let me borrow her laptop to add her to my flight back, and made us sandwiches for lunch. I needed to see my father at some point, but I wasn't in any rush. I'd seen him many times, and I was making up what I'd lost with Lena.

I bought us tickets to see Romeo and Juliet. It wasn't about the play itself as much as what it meant to me, and I knew that wouldn't be lost on Lena. I'd already told her I loved her, but actions spoke louder than words, and I was finally ready to show her.