As soon as Antonio and Christopher arrived at their restaurant, they were greeted by the restaurant manager.
"Welcome, Mr. Legaspi and Young Master Antonio! I am the manager of this place and I will be guiding you to your room."
Christopher and Antonio both nodded their heads to the manager.
Along their way to their private room, the manager informed them that their guests, the Grimmer father and son, were already waiting inside for them.
When they arrived at the door of the room, the restaurant manager knocked on the door before opening it for them.
Christopher took one step inside the room and Antonio closely followed behind him.
Because of Christopher's tall build that contrasted to Antonio's small one, the two men inside the room can only see Christopher entering the door, and not Antonio.
"You're early … sorry for making you wait."
Antonio heard his father speaking to the other party inside the room.
"Hello, Uncle!"
"My, my! Don't apologize, we didn't wait that much."
He then heard two male voices speaking one after another to his father.
The former's voice sounds like an awkward greeting, while the latter spoke cordially in response to his father's statement.
Antonio observed as Christopher moved from in front of him to go and hug a fine-looking middle aged man in a friendly manner.
At that moment, he heard a man's voice calling out his nickname.
"Yoyo?"
He turned his gaze to look at the direction of the voice calling him.
There, he met a very handsome young man looking at him with an astonished expression on his face.
'Golden eyes?'
His time in Paraiso café together with Alden a few days ago came to his mind and he immediately recognized the man's face.
"Hello! We meet again!"
He greeted the other with a bright expression.
For some reason, he can't help but feel excited to be friends with the young man in front of him.
Christopher told him that their family has been doing business with them for a very long time now, so he thought that it wouldn't hurt forming friendship with the other.
"Yes, we meet again."
The other man greeted him back with a gentle smile on his face.
That made Antonio slightly shocked because he still remembers how the other person ignored him when he smiled at him a few days ago in the café.
He then saw the young man move his hands to ask for a handshake.
And since he wants to be friendly to his dad's friend's son, he took the other's hand and shook it with a very warm smile on his face.
"Have you two already met each other, Yoyo?"
Antonio looked at Christopher's direction and answered while pulling his hand back from the handshake.
"Oh, we saw each other a few days ago when Brother Al took me outside the mansion, but we didn't have a chance to converse with one another."
His answer made Mikhall, the young man who just shook his hands, flinched.
"Is that so? Please forgive my son, he is really an awkward fellow."
The middle aged man beside Christopher said while staring at Antonio.
"Yoyo, this is your uncle, Lawrence Grimmer and the young man beside you is his son, Mikhall Grimmer."
Christopher said as he introduced his friend and his friend's son to Antonio.
"You can call me Uncle Rence, Yoyo … we actually once met each other when you were seven, but it's understandable if you don't remember us since it's already been a long time."
Lawrence spoke in a warm and gentle voice as he walked toward Antonio and patted his head.
"How about we continue our conversation with a meal?"
Christopher said and the four of them moved toward the table and sat down.
The table is of a rectangular shape, so the Grimmer duo sat opposite the Legaspi duo.
As soon as they settled down, Christopher rang the call bell on the table.
Soon after, waiters entered one by one while pushing a food trolley that contained a variety of dishes.
They then began serving the food in a very quick manner before leaving the room.
"Please ring the bell if you need anything else."
One of them said politely before finally closing the room as he left.
'Wow!!!'
Antonio can't help but be amazed at the amount of delicious foods in front of him.
Christopher told the restaurant in advance to just serve everything they have on the menu as it will be time-consuming to make the other party select a dish then wait for it for several minutes.
Gulp.
'I wish I'll recover as soon as possible … I wanna eat those lobsters and beef recipes.'
Antonio thought as he felt disappointed at the fact that he isn't allowed to eat hard foods yet.
"Let's eat."
Christopher said and they began choosing what food they should put on their plate.
"Yoyo, what would you like to have first?"
He asked his son.
Antonio looked at the dishes on the table before he answered.
"Oh, I'll just have the mashed potatoes over there."
He said as he pointed to the corner of the table near where Mikhall was sitting.
And as if waiting for this very moment, Mikhall swiftly grabbed the bowl of mashed potatoes and carefully placed it in front of Antonio.
Antonio was surprised at the other's gesture.
He never expected that Mikhall would take the initiative to give it to him.
He assumed that he needed to stand up from his seat to reach the food since the other was already busy eating the dish on his plate.
However, he felt grateful that the other must have done it in consideration for his short hands that can't reach the food that he wanted to have.
He smiled at Mikhall who just finished placing the bowl in front of him.
"Thanks, Mikhall."
Mikhall nodded his head and uttered a gentle response.
"You're welcome, Yoyo."
Antonio almost raised his eyebrows when he saw the attractive smile of Mikhall while saying his nickname in a very soft tone.
'If he calls me by my nickname, should I do the same? He must have decided to call me that since it's easier than pronouncing my real name.'
Meanwhile, their fathers beside them exchange a meaningful glance as they witness their sons' interaction.
'Didn't he say that he isn't fond of him? Yet here he is, grinning widely while staring at Yoyo with a rare soft gaze … where did my real son go? Who is possessing him right now?'
Lawrence thought as he never witnessed his son smile and look at someone like this before.
Even to him and his wife, Mikhall rarely smiles ... add to that that most of those smiles are forced.
It was only now that he saw his son genuinely smiling and being so gentle to someone.
On the other hand, Christopher thought as he gazed at Mikhall and Antonio.
'That cold child seems to have a soft spot for Yoyo.'
He then looked at his friend who was sitting across from him who suddenly started speaking.
"By the way, Chris, will you be enrolling Yoyo to a school this year?"
Christopher paused for a while before he answered.
"Yeah, he seems to be recovering very fast so he will be okay to attend school later on."
They suddenly heard their sons having a friendly conversation.
"How old are you, Mikhall?"
Antonio asked the young man in front of him, who immediately answered him.
"I am already nineteen."
"Ah! I'm sorry for being disrespectful … I should address you as Brother Mikhall from now on."
He quickly apologized as he has been impolite to the other by only calling him by his name, when in fact, the other man is two years older than him.
Mikhall slightly stiffened when he heard Antonio calling him 'brother' in a velvety voice, and felt something tickling his heart.
"You can call me by my nickname, Mikey."
He muttered, hoping that Antonio would call him again with the same soft voice.
"Oh! Sure, Brother Mikey."
Antonio said in a happy tone.
'Amazing! I never thought we'd become this close in just a day.'
He thought since he assumed that the other doesn't like him because of their previous encounter in the Paraiso café, but it seems like that's not the case.
Mikhall, who heard Antonio calling him like that, can't stop himself from grinning ear to ear.
'Yoyo is so adorable!!! It's driving me crazy.'
He thought while staring at Antonio's gorgeous visage and clenched his hand under the table to suppress himself from pinching Antonio's cheek.
Coughed.
Just then, they heard a sound of someone coughing so loudly as if something was stuck in his throat.
They turned their head and saw Lawrence coughing continuously while stretching his hand to grab a glass of water.
"Uncle Rence!"
"Here, drink it."
"Father!"
Antonio, Christopher, and MIkhall spoke simultaneously in a worried manner.
Lawrence immediately drank the water Christopher gave him and sighed.
"I'm fine now."
He said when the three people inside the room kept looking at him with concerned faces.
"What happened, Rence? It's rare for you to choke while eating."
Christopher asked as he knew how his friend always slowly munched his food to avoid choking.
"Don't worry about it, I was just shocked about something unimportant."
Lawrence answered and the three people looking at him sighed.
"You should be careful when eating, Dad."
Mikhall said from beside him.
Lawrence immediately glared at his son.
'And whose fault do you think it is?'
He silently thought.
For some reason, he wanted to drag his son to their home and have a very serious talk with him.
The reason for his choking incident is Mikhall's expressions when he talked to Antonio.
A very surprising realization hit him while observing his son's interaction with his friend's son.
'That's the facial expression of Chris whenever he looks at Antoinette back when she was still alive.'
A gaze full of affection.
Lawrence felt helpless as he gazed at his friend.
'I pray that you will not torture my son in the future, Chris.'
His gaze then turned toward Antonio.
"He looks so much like Antoinette."
He subconsciously muttered.
"Yes, he does."
Christopher also muttered as he stared at his son.
Antonio, who is silently eating a chocolate pudding, heard an unexpected question directed to him.
"By the way, Yoyo, have you ever thought of becoming a celebrity?"
Lawrence curiously asked, making both Christopher and Mikhall pay great attention to the conversation.
For Christopher, as much as he doesn't want Antonio to be under public's attention, he also would want to support his son if he desires to join the entertainment industry.
After all, Antoinette, the mother of his two sons and also his late wife, was a popular actress when she was still alive.
Moreover, Antonio and Alden's maternal relatives are mostly working in the line of entertainment—one of them is a movie director, another one is a producer, while the other one is a famous singer.
While for Mikhall, he doesn't really want Antonio to become a celebrity.
If Antonio becomes a celebrity, people would likely want to always do things that will invade his privacy.
Above all, Mikhall doesn't want more people to ogle at Antonio.
"Pardon?"
Antonio asked back to Lawrence's question.
"Ah, I'm just asking if you want to step in the entertainment industry and become a celebrity … just like your mother and some of your maternal relatives."
Lawrence explained and waited for Antonio's answer.
However, time passed by but Antonio still didn't give any response.