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“I’m sorry you weren’t there to bury her,” I suddenly say, taking his hand. “You should have been.”
“I should have been.” He nods. “But in some ways, I’m actually relieved I wasn’t.” He must see the surprise on my face, because he chuckles bitterly, points at his own chest, and says, “I told you: coward.”
“Well, if you’re a coward, then so am I. The only reason I came with you the night we left is because I didn’t want to have to tell Cee that I was pregnant.”
“At least you had noble intentions. You were trying to protect your sister.”
“And you were trying to protect us,” I emphatically remind him. “I may not always believe that, but today, I do.”
He gives me a tired smile. “So I suppose what we can agree on is that we’re both cowards with good intentions.” I know he’s joking, and despite everything that’s happening, it almost makes me laugh.
“We should talk more, Dad.” I gently nudge him. “Like this, I mean.”
“The irony is, without Ilarion, I doubt it would have been possible.”
I glance at him. “I made him promise me that he wouldn’t hurt you, you know.”
His eyebrows lift for a moment, but he doesn’t seem as relieved by that assurance as I would have thought. “He promised you that?”
“Well, I mean, we didn’t pinky swear or anything, but he did tell me he wouldn’t. And I believe him.”
Dad gazes at me for a second before he stands and walks over to the window. “I guess that answers that question,” he says, peeking out into the street through the blinds.
“What question?”
“If he still cares for you.”
I stiffen. “If he does, it’s only by association. I’m his son’s mother. A means to an end.”
He side-eyes me but lets the topic fade into the tense silence. The air conditioning clicks on and blusters sadly for a few moments before sighing away once again.
I’m just starting to breathe and calm down when Dad speaks up. “Did he mention anything about Celine?”
Then I clench right back up again. How do I tell him that for his eldest daughter, the last five years were filled with depression, near-assassinations, heartache, physical therapy, and a suicide attempt?
“He said she was doing okay.”
Dad sighs, and in that rise and fall of his chest, I swear that for the briefest of seconds, I can actually see the weight he’s carried with him all these years. Like chains drooped over his shoulders.
“Well. I suppose that’s something, then.”
12
ILARION
I expected to feel something when I saw him.
I just didn’t expect the feeling to be sointense.
He is my son. I think I would have known it in my soul, whether he looked like me or not. Of course, the fact that he does look like me helps a lot.
His hair, a shade lighter than mine, flops over his forehead as he scampers around the garden. His fingers are dark with dirt, as are his mother’s, but both of them are laughing.
She is wearing shorts that show an expanse of smooth skin and a thin white cotton blouse that glows translucent when the sunlight hits her. I can see the pale outline of her pink bra and the slim lines of her torso.
As I watch, she hoists him into the rope swing hanging from a tree in the yard. His laugh grows louder as she pushes him back and forth.
It’s easy to notice things as I watch. It was only after she left that I kept reminding myself of all the things I never paid enough attention to. The crease in her forehead when she is deep in thought. The way her cheeks dimple when she smiles. The little tremble in her fingers when she is resisting the urge to bite her nails.
