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“Excuse me?” Edward glares at me.
I turn back toward him and give him my own cool stare. “You’re not going to talk to him that way, not in front of me.”
Edward flicks an icy glance at Sebastian, eyebrows raised. “Well. I’ll just be going, then.”
“Edward.” Catherine turns toward him, reaching for his hand, which he ignores, storming off. She turns back our way, pivoting toward me, then back to Sebastian. “I just wanted to smooth things over—”
“There’s no smoothing things over with us, Mom.” Sebastian squeezes my hand, like he’s shoring himself up. “And while I…love you, I don’t…I don’t know how to see you and him without it hurting. Really fucking badly. I need space and time from you. I need to deal with a lot of shit that he did that you either knew about and ignored or chose not to see.”
Her eyes fill. “Sebby—”
“Please don’t,” he says tightly. “Just…please. Leave me alone right now. I’ll be in contact when I’m ready to talk, but I’ll warn you, you’re not going to like what I have to say. And if you won’t hear me out when I’m ready to talk, then we will be done, Mom, I promise you. I’m not doing this anymore, pretending this was all my fault, that I’ve been the only problem all these years. It took all three of us to be where we are today, and like hell am I going to keep messing myself up by lying to make you feel better. Goodbye.”
He turns, dragging me with him.
I glance over my shoulder. His mother watches him as we walk away, her face hard, tears welling in her eyes.
“Seb—”
He shakes his head, silencing me. With his lead, we take a turn down a hallway, then quickly down another. Sebastian shoves open a door, drags me inside, then slams it shut.
I don’t even have a chance to look around, to make heads or tails of where we are, before he wraps his arms around me and buries his face in my neck.
“Just…” His breathing is fast and unsteady. He squeezes me so tight, my breathing isn’t very steady either. “Just hold me, please.”
I wrap my arms around him as he presses his face harder into my neck. He doesn’t make a sound. He barely moves.
But I feel hot, wet tears on my skin.
His.
Carefully, waiting for any sign it’s unwelcome, I start to rub his back in big, gentle circles. Sebastian melts into me, giving me more of his weight, his head heavier on my neck.
I’m silent because he needs me to be, and because sometimes there’s nothing to say. Sometimes there’s only quiet comfort to give, time and space to hold for pain that reassuring words and paltry solutions can’t touch.
“I need a fucking therapist,” he mutters against my skin. Straightening, he wipes his eyes with his palms. “And a new fucking family.”
I peer up at him with a brave face, trying to hold back my own tears, to be the steady one while he falls apart. My hands settle on his shoulders, squeezing gently. He lists into me again, dropping his cheek against my forehead. A heavy sigh leaves him.
“I think a therapist is a great idea,” I tell him quietly, linking our hands together. “And while they aren’t the tamest bunch of people to be around, and they’ll probably—no, definitely—get under your skin at some point, you’ve already got a new family waiting in the wings, eager to love you, to be as much your family as you need them to be.”
He looks at me curiously, brow furrowed.
I brush his hair back from those tear-wet cheeks and smile. “Mine.”
27
ZIGGY
Playlist: “Beige,” Yoke Lore
If you’d have told me a month ago, as I sat at my parents’ table, frustrated and lonely and stuck, that I’d be here tonight, candlelight dancing over my family’s faces, (gluten-free only) crumbs littering the white linen that we rest our elbows on, I’d have laughed in your face.
Yet here we are.
I smile as I glance around the table, at my parents smiling our way, heads together. Willa grinning into her wine as she tries and fails to take a sip without snorting a laugh. Frankie, head thrown back as she cackles. My brothers laughing so hard. Ryder, wiping his eyes as he belly laughs. Ren clutching his chest, a sign he’s truly tickled. Viggo chuckling as he tips back in his chair and scrubs his face.
And to my right, Sebastian, elbows on the table, head hung as he laughs right from his belly, so deep and hard his whole torso shakes. He glances up right at me and catches me staring. I smile, my cheeks warm from my glass of red wine…and maybe from something else.
