When Noah eventually arrived home that she night, he was met with the faces of his worried parents answering the door as soon as he rang the bell. He felt a strong sense of guilt as he took in their worried appearances, and gave them a quiet apology whilst staring abashedly at the floor.

Eventually they sat down for a talk, hot mugs of tea in from of them, and Noah decided to follow Casimir's advice and be straightforward with them.

Noah had to credit Casimir- in this instance, honesty really did seem like the best road to go down. Much to his surprise, Noah's parents seemed to understand where he was coming from and actually took what he said into consideration.

As he trekked up the stairs to go to his room later that night, Noah couldn't help but silently thank Casimir. He had a hopeful feeling that things would start to change for the better around here, and he had Cas to thank for that.

The one negative that had come out of the little chat was that Noah's parents expressed their concern that he was spending too much time with Cas.

Noah found this a bit absurd, considering how often the two of them hung out before the accident. But at the same time he understood their argument that he hadn't been spending much time with them, and that they missed him.

Noah couldn't help but feel bad that he had been neglecting spending time with them, but it was almost like he didn't have a choice.

He was drawn to Casimir, like a moth to a flame. But Casimir was so much more than a flame, he was the whole damn fire.

But Noah decided he had to be more adamant. He couldn't count on Casimir to be his only form of human contact for the whole summer. By the time he went back to school in September he wouldn't be at Casimir's side 24/7, so the sooner he got used to the concept of time apart, the better.

He decided against sending Casimir a text to explain the situation, not wanting to come across as clingy. Instead he just chose not to text Casimir to make plans for the next day as he had every other night, instead just sending him a short text as a thanks for the advice.

Setting his phone back down on the desk, he changed into some comfier clothes before joining his parents downstairs for a movie.

"What did you pick?" His mother asked, curled up next to her husband on the couch, a blanket over them and a glass of wine in her hand.

"Erin Brockovich." Noah replied with a small smile, pulling the well worn DVD case off the shelf above the television.

"Don't we have a ban on that?" His dad asked with a laugh, referring to the ban they had put on watching Erin Brockovich after Noah chose it for every single movie night.

"We'll let him off for tonight Michael, the poor boy hasn't seen it in six months." His mom said, her eyes sparking with amusement as she stood up from the couch.

"Actually, one of the nurses gave me a copy." Noah admitted to his dad with a small laugh when his mom momentarily left the room to make some popcorn.

"Don't mention that to your mother," His dad replied with an amused grin.

Noah couldn't help but grin back. He always suspected his dad had a secret soft spot for this movie.

"What are you two boys laughing at?" His mom asked from the doorway, hands on her hips and her head cocked to the side.

"Nothing at all dear." Michael sung over his shoulder, sending Noah a wink as his wife gave him a light snack to the back of the head with a tea towel.

"One of these days I'll leave you Michael, and you'll regret every lying to me." She warned, coming back into the room with a steaming bowl of popcorn in her hands.

"I look forward to it." His dad joked back, a mischievous glint in his eyes.

Noah watched the whole scene unfold, counting himself lucky to have such great parents. They seemed perfect for each other, and he too hoped that maybe one day he would have something like that too.

With Casimir, preferably, but Noah chose not to dwell too hard on that fact.

Casimir is straight.

Still, the thought didn't leave his mind as the movie played. He watched his parents tease each other and hold hands on the opposite side of the room, and Noah suddenly felt the urge to tell them.

He paused the movie, without even realising he had decided to do so. His parents looked over at him and he froze, his throat suddenly tightening and refusing to let him spit out the words.

"Noah?" His mom asked with concern, putting down her glass of wine and sitting up straighter.

His hands began to shake, and hot tears began to leak from his eyes. His parents looked at each other in alarm, but before either of them could speak Noah beat them to it.

"I'm gay."

Noah blurted it out without meaning to, his hands shooting up to cover his mouth as the words escaped him.

The room stayed silent for a moment, before his mom spoke up again.

"Is that it?" She asked, her voice filled with relief.

Noah was taken aback for a moment. He didn't expect them to be mad, but maybe a little shocked?

"Yeah.." He replied slowly, confusion evident in his voice.

Both his parents let out a relieved laugh. "Jesus Noah, you had us worried for a minute." His dad said, chuckling lightly.

"You're not surprised?" Noah asked, still not quite sure as to what was going on.

"Surprised? Noah, I'd be a lot more surprised if you were straight." Alison said, her voice filled with amusement.

"Oh." Was all Noah could say. Was it really that obvious? "Okay then."

"Honey, we love and support you no matter what. Whether you date boys, girls, neither, or both. It doesn't matter to us as long as you're happy and comfortable." Alison said, and her husband murmured in agreement.

Noah couldn't help the small smile that broke out on his face. "Thank you." He said, finding himself at loss for how to really express how grateful he was to have them.

"Do you want to talk about it? Or are we going to resume the movie?" Michael asked, confirming Noah's earlier suspicions that his dad secretly loved this movie.

"Nothing really to talk about." Noah said with a shrug, reaching forward to grab another handful of popcorn.

"Okay then, let's peg ahead with the movie." Alison said, picking up her wine glass again and turning to face the television screen.

"Sure." Noah mumbled, hitting the play button and sinking back into the armchair.

He wiped the drying tears from his face, unable to help but feeling slightly silly for getting so worked up.

But on the bright side, he couldn't help the grin that kept making it's way onto his face for the rest of the night. Not only were his parents cool with him being gay, he had finally found the courage to say aloud the words that had been on the tip of his tongue since he was fifteen years old, and the back of his mind for a lot longer than that.

***

Noah strode languidly towards the supermarket, hands jingling the loose change in his pocket as he walked. The sun was out, the air was warm and all in all, Noah was content.

It had been two days since he had come out to his parents. He had taken into consideration what they said about spending all his time with Casimir, and so it was also two days since he had seen Casimir. Tomorrow, however, all would be better. Noah had been feeling particularly mischievous, and had planned a sleepover with Casimir involving Cas sneaking in his window. He was sure that if he had asked his parents they would have said yes anyway, but it was more fun this way.

Him and Cas used to always do things like that when they were younger. Sneaking each other along to family cinema days, in the very back seats with one crouched on the ground so as not to be seen. Hiding upstairs until it was 'too late to go home' and they would have to have a sleepover. Their parents would never object to the other tagging along, but it always proved more adventurous when they planned it themselves.

So now he was on his way to the nearest Walmart in the hopes of collecting a huge enough pile of junk food that they would find themselves at risk of becoming diabetic overnight.

Slipping in the door of the store, he was hit with a relieving gust of cold air being blown through the air conditioning vent. He strode through the aisles, grabbing everything and anything that looked like it had a high enough sugar content.

Halfway down the soda isle, his attention was caught by a thin woman with faded blonde hair. She looked strikingly familiar, and Noah found himself halting his footing. He stared at her, an annoying niggling in the back of his mind. He did a double take when he finally realized why- that was Juny Daniels, Casimir's mother.

Noah was rooted to the spot, staring at the oblivious woman with open-mouthed shock. Juny Daniels, once a fine strong woman with almost as much energy and life as her son, was now nothing but a whisper of her former self.

He started to feel slightly sick, but was unable to bring himself to go say hello to the woman he once would have considered a second mother. She was thin, worn out and tired looking. Whilst once upon a time she never would have left her house without looking stellar, she now wore shapeless clothes and had her hair half tied back in a way Noah could describe best as raggedy.

It was only when Noah looked around Juny that he realized what aisle she was in— the medication one. The realization sent a cold wave of nausea over him, and everything began to piece into place. Juny Daniels was sick and by the looks of her, it was serious.

Was this what Casimir had been talking about, when he said that a lot had happened over the past six months?

But at the same time, that didn't seem quite like it was the full explanation for everything. Even with a sick mother, Casimir would have made time to see Noah.

Unless.. unless Juny's illness was somehow related to the accident? Noah was positive that there had been nothing about her health mentioned to him before.

What if, somehow, the Daniels family were more involved in what happened that day than Noah could remember?

He had so many questions, he didn't know where to begin. Making his way to the checkout he paid for the junk food, his focus dissipated to the point where the shopkeeper has to tap his arm to catch his attention. Apologizing hurriedly, he rushed out of the shop with his bags in tow. Full of food that he now felt sick at the thought of eating.

Once on the path home, he used to fresh air to his advantage as a means to clear his head. The only way to get any answers out of Casimir was to ask him point blank- Cas never bothered with grey area, everything was black and white with him.

Tonight, it would have to be. Noah wasn't sure what was wrong with Juny Daniels, but if there was any way at all it would help him remember what happened the day of the accident, he was going to get to the bottom of it.