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Unfortunately, Courtney insists we all go out to dinner afterward, so it’s well after nine o’clock in the evening by the time she drops me off outside of my house. I throw her a half wave before making my way up toward the front porch, surprised to find Sebastian sitting on the steps waiting for me.
I jog toward him, knowing that after the day I’ve had he’s the only person I want to see. That is until I spot the bottle of whiskey dangling from his fingers.
“Sebastian?” I question hesitantly, knowing immediately that something isn’t right. “What are you doing here?”
“I didn’t have anywhere else to go. I just couldn’t stay there. I couldn’t stay there another second,” he mutters more to himself than to me, taking a long drag from the bottle.
“Hey.” I take a seat next to him on the steps, angling my body to face him. “What’s going on? Talk to me.” I slide my hand across his shoulders.
“I can’t do this. I can’t fucking be who everyone thinks I should be. I’m going insane.” He pounds on the side of his head with a closed fist, the abruptness of his actions cause me to jump slightly.
“Sebastian. You’re drunk. Why don’t you come inside and we can talk?” I suggest, not realizing how inebriated he is until this very moment.
“I don’t want to fucking talk!” His voice echoes around us, his menacing gaze finding mine.
I can honestly say that I’ve never been afraid of Sebastian, but there’s something scary about the way he’s looking at me right now—his eyes full of rage and unpredictability.
“Okay, then tell me what I can do?” I try another angle, not really knowing how to approach him in this mind state. I’ve never seen him anywhere close to this drunk before, and it’s clear something happened to make him want to drown himself in a bottle of whiskey.
“Unless you can somehow magically grant me new parents, there’s nothing you can do,” he bites, taking another long drink.
“What happened, Sebastian? Did your father do something?” I ask, knowing things haven’t been easy for him on the home front recently.
Things have gotten much worse between him and his father since his parents learned that he had accepted the offer from LSU. Sebastian knew that losing the control over his future was going to be a tough pill for his father to swallow, but I don’t think even he expected the backlash he’s gotten because of it.
“Definedo something?” he says flatly, staring straight ahead.
“Please talk to me?” I plead, wrapping my hand around his bicep in an effort to get him to look at me.
“What do you want me to say, Tess? That I’m the biggest disappointment in the world? How having me was the biggest mistake of my father’s life? That he wishes I had never been born?”
I open my mouth to say something but can’t find any words. I knew Jonathan Baxter was a piece of work, but this is a new low even for him. The anger I feel boiling in my chest only increases the pain I feel for Sebastian. How any father could say those things to his son is beyond me.
“Fuck. He’s right, isn’t he? I am a fucking disappointment,” he adds bitterly.
“No, you’re not. Don’t say that.” I quickly reposition myself in front of him, taking his face in my hands as I force him to meet my gaze. “You are not a disappointment, Sebastian, not to me. You are the most driven, talented person I’ve ever met, and I am in awe of you every single day. You make me want to be more like you. You make me want to fight for the things I want and believe that I can do anything. You did that, Sebastian.”
“Did I?” His voice softens. “Because from where I’m sitting you’re just another person in a long line of people I’ve let down.”
“How did you let me down?” I argue, not letting him look away when he tries.
“I chose college over you?” He phrases it like a question.
“No, you chose to betterourfuture by doing what’s right for you right now. You’re right to follow your dreams. You’re not choosing anything over me, you’re choosing itforme.”
“If you believe that then you’re even more delusional than I thought.” His words are like a slap across the face, and I immediately let my hands fall away. “I chose it for me. Because that’s what I do, I make everything about me.”
“You’re the least selfish person I know,” I insist, not letting his attempt to hurt me get in the way of talking him off the ledge. He’s trying to push me away, and I won’t let him self-implode because of some bullshit his dad said to him.
“No, I’m not, Tess.” He stands abruptly causing me to stumble backward a couple of steps. “I shouldn’t have come here.” He takes off through the yard toward his Jeep which I just now notice is parked across the street from my neighbor’s house.
“Sebastian,” I holler after him, following close behind. “Sebastian,” I try again when he crosses the street and throws open the driver’s side door. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I make a grab at the nearly empty whiskey bottle, managing to catch him off guard enough to yank it free.
“What the fuck, Tess,” he roars, grabbing for the bottle but missing it by a centimeter.
Launching the bottle as hard as I can, it hits the curb on the other side of the street and shatters into a million pieces.
Sebastian just stares at me wide-eyed for what feels like an eternity before the realization of what I just did seems to catch up to him, by which time I’m already trying to wrangle the keys from his hand.
