「Vira, do you or do you not?」I asked him.

He looked nervous, and his face was a confused mess. He was fidgety and didn’t know what to answer.

「U-uncle... I-I like h-her... But I- I don’t know, I don’t know if I L-love her... I just don’t know...」

This entire mess started because he recently started avoiding Stella and his friends, and while I held the fort, I couldn’t handle it for more than a few days, his friends started questioning what happened. Although weirdly Stella didn’t question it. And when I asked him ‘why?’ He told me that he ‘felt’ like he liked Stella more than his friends. And so, being the idiot that I am, directly asked him, “You love her?”

I didn’t want to rush him or anything like that... But I think it’s only fair that we figure out what he’s feeling. He needs someone he can say everything to. I want to be that person for him. He’s someone I’ve been with for his entire life, and I feel as responsible for him as a parent would. And it wouldn’t be a lie to say that I consider Stella the same, though it was a shorter time, I still love them both.

The both of them seem to like each other but they don’t say anything. And now Vira’s just hurting himself. I don’t want that. He can’t start running away from his problems like I... did. I don’t remember what I ‘ran’ away from, but I remember that I did.

Eitherway, I just confronted him about it, because he needs to start considering what she ‘means’ to him. Is she a friend or someone he likes? He’s pretty confused himself, so I thought I should be upfront about it.

I put my hand on his shoulder and said, 「Vira, you don’t need to be nervous. I’m only asking because I care about you, okay?」

「Okay...」he calmed down, breathed in and then said. 「Uncle.. I honestly don’t know... I think I like her.. Whenever I see her smile, my chest feels so tight... My throat dries up... and I feel so embarrassed just saying this... But I also consider her a friend. But.. I couldn’t see her face while feeling like this...」

I kind of understand what he’s feeling. It’s this contradiction, between knowing he cares for her because she’s a friend, but could that mean he cares about her because it’s more than just a friendship.

「Why don’t you tell her how you feel?」

「I... don’t know how she’d feel if I do that.」

「Vira... It’s okay to feel scared. But running away from facing it won’t solve anything okay?」

I ruffled his hair, he was curled up in a ball. But he hugged me and then, he said 「I’ll... Tell her when I’m ready. Thank you uncle.」

A decision to hold off for now? It’s fine. Whatever he goes through with, I’ll support it. Even if he wants to run away, if that’s what he truly wants, then I’m not going to go against it.

For some reason hugging him I could feel how much he’d grown. When he was first here, he was small enough to sit on my lap, and now he’s grown into a young man, so immature but kind, so young but clever. He truly had grown up from the little boy he was.

I mean to be fair, he even reached me to my shoulders(?) height. So safe to say he’ll probably be taller than me. Or maybe I’m just short... Ah well.

But regardless I could feel what Vira felt whenever he saw Stella. It was this feeling of embarrassment combined with care, with a dash of wanting to hug her. I couldn’t even quite put into words. No matter how many pages I write, I wouldn’t be able to tell anyone what he truly ‘felt’. Love is not something that can be written down as a formula, it is something that can only be experienced.

What Vira had experienced can’t be expressed within my own imagination. I don’t think anyone in this world could understand how he truly felt, other than, himself.

Even love from a parent to a child, or a man to a woman, or anything else. It can never be written down on a page, without it losing its true meaning. What he felt was the ‘meaning’ of love.