252. Freedom
252. Freedom
“Do you think it all happened too fast?” he asks, making a tear slip from me as he covers my hand with his other one. “When Evelyn pointed the gun, it was like time slowed down. Everything moved so slowly. But at the same time, it all felt absurdly clear.”
My chest tightens, and the hand beneath his trembles lightly.
“I wasn’t thinking about being a hero. I was thinking about you, about Christopher, and about your baby.” His brow furrows slightly, like his eyes are starting to burn, like a crack is finally forming in his resilience. “I don’t even know why, but in that moment, I thought, ah… I can’t let this happen again. Strange, right?”
He laughs—or tries to—his brow knitting tighter.
“I was so scared… not for me. I was scared of the idea of losing you… of losing Christopher along the way. It’s a strange feeling I still haven’t figured out.”
“So you stepped in front of her?” My voice breaks into a sob, and I press my lips together hard, another tear dripping free, impossible to control.
“I did.” He doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t look away. “And I’d take every bullet that misfired when she pulled the trigger, emptying the clip. Because somehow, that felt like the only thing I could still do right.”
“You’re insane…” I murmur, my voice fraying, tangled with the sobs that won’t stop coming back. “What if the gun hadn’t jammed? What if the bullet had hit your head instead of your spine, Sebastian?”
“I’d be dead, of course.” He gives me a crooked smile. “Or in a coma for years.”
“Very funny.” I scowl, squeezing his hand hard, almost painfully. “And what about me? How would I live with that guilt?” I pause, forcing the knot down. “How am I supposed to live with this now?”
“The way you always have. Happily married, with children, building a family.” Sebastian’s face softens. “I used to tell you Christopher didn’t love you, that he wasn’t enough for you…” He pauses, looking at my face with such tenderness. “I was wrong.”
Sebastian lifts his hand off mine, but I don’t let go of the other. He doesn’t even try, really. One holds me back, while the other rises slowly to the top of my hair, stroking me like when we were kids, in those rare moments when no one else was watching—when the doubts crept in, when they called me cursed.
“Christopher loves you,” he says firmly. “And even if I forgot that for a moment… all I’ve ever wanted was for you to be happy. Do you understand, Charlotte? I want you to be happy, that’s all I’ve ever wanted. I’d do anything to see you happy—even be your human shield against a psychopath.”
A wet laugh escapes me, and I shake my head.
“You’re impossible,” I say through the mix of laughter and tears, wiping my damp face with the back of my free hand.
“It’s my charm.” Sebastian answers with that familiar crooked smile, his fingers combing gently through my hair. “Been working for years.”
For a moment, I let myself fall into silence, into the memory of childhood. For a moment, I just look at him, imprinting on my soul that he’s okay. He’s alive. We’re all alive.
“And you?” I whisper after a while, finding my voice. “Will you be happy, Sebastian?”
His hand stills, heavy on the crown of my head, as he really thinks about my question. Then his touch drifts down to my face, slowly wiping the wet trail of a tear with his thumb, so gently, so… tenderly.
“Maybe it won’t make sense to you, or to anyone else, but… I’m not afraid. I’m not sinking into fear, into uncertainty. Honestly, since I took that bullet… it’s like I opened my eyes for the first time. Like I could finally breathe. And when I woke up, even after Grant told me I can’t walk anymore… I felt this strange sense of freedom.”
“Freedom?” I echo, my eyes widening slightly.
“Like waking up from a long dream.” He pulls his hand back, letting it fall to the mattress as if he’s too weak to keep it lifted. “Being where and how I’m supposed to be.”
“You shouldn’t be like this…” My voice cracks. “If it weren’t for me pushing… if I had stopped when you tried to hold me back in the bathroom…”
“Don’t blame yourself, Charlotte.” Sebastian says firmly, squeezing my hand a little tighter. “I certainly don’t. Not you, not Christopher, not William, not my grandfather…” He pauses, like pressing a finger against an open wound, but still, he takes a deep breath and steadies himself. “…Not even myself.”
“It’s ironic,” I murmur, biting my lip to contain the sob. “That only after you’ve lost the most, you feel the least imprisoned.”
“Yeah.” He nods, thoughtful. “Maybe sometimes the world has to stop, you know? Strip everything away, until we’re forced to see what really matters… what goes unsaid, undervalued.”
“And what matters to you now?” I ask, though I already know the answer.
He looks at me with a quiet, raw intensity that undoes me inside, and with a smile he says, “Our family.”
Sebastian doesn’t look away. There’s so much clarity in his eyes, so much honesty, that I feel my defenses dissolving one by one, until nothing’s left but reality—the bare truth we took too long to see.
“I don’t want to lose anyone else, Charlotte.” His voice is low, steady. “I’ve seen how easy it is to let what matters slip away, how easy it is to corrupt it, forget it… I won’t make that mistake again. Not with you. Not with Christopher or William. I want the family together, even if Grandpa isn’t with us anymore. I won’t push everyone away and repeat his mistakes.”
A chill runs through me, not biting but refreshing in my chest, and I think of the paths we all once took: William abandoning the family, East Manor turning into crumbling luxury… Sebastian drowning in a life of promiscuity, fighting so badly with Christopher they couldn’t stay in the same room for almost a decade. Even Elodie, who left for abroad with my uncle after Christopher cast him aside.
All of us… all of us changed our fate.
Look, Grandpa…
Christopher was making apple bunnies for Sebastian.
William stayed at the hospital all night, only leaving after they brought Sebastian out of sedation, and only because Elodie promised she’d stay in his place. Elodie.
Could you have imagined that, Grandpa? That our bonds would tighten like this? That one day we’d be close enough to share a secret? That we’d be united by something stronger than blood?
“Just don’t tell them.” Sebastian speaks again, with that tone that pretends to be annoyed but hides tenderness under sarcasm. “Christopher’s already acting weird enough, bringing me a basket and making…” He gestures lazily at the plate, hardly able to look. “Damn apple bunnies.”
I can’t help laughing, and I let go of his hand to set the plate in my lap.
“And William… the only thing that’d stop him bragging about his skills would be tormenting me for going soft.” He wrinkles his nose but still takes a bunny, fragile and funny in his large hand.
Sebastian studies the apple bunny with an expression caught between fake disdain and strange reverence, as if he doesn’t want to admit that the simple gesture touched him more than it should. He turns it between his fingers, lets out a fake sigh, and finally bites one of the ears.
“Ridiculous,” he says, his mouth still full. “But… good.”
A damp laugh bursts from me, muffled behind the back of my hand.
“My God! You just complimented Christopher. Now that’s strange!”
“Don’t get excited.” He points at me with the half-bitten piece. “I complimented the bunny. Christopher’s still an asshole.”
“Uh-huh, sure…” I shake my head, smiling so hard I feel the pressure in my still-teary cheeks. “You just can’t admit you liked it, can you?”
“Are you starting to tease me too, Charlotte?”
Sebastian arches a brow, that almost mischievous glint in his eye—the one he’s always used to hide behind irony.
“I’m just making sure I survive. Remember when he found out I still kept my childhood teddy bear in my room? He only stopped giving me stuffed animals for my birthday when I turned twenty! If I admit it, he’ll never leave me alone… he’ll make me eat porridge shaped like animals for the rest of my life.”
The image is so absurd I burst out laughing, and he joins me—a short, hoarse laugh, but so real it fills the room like unexpected balm. For a moment, there’s no hospital, no pain, no broken past or rewritten future… only the two of us, laughing over apple bunnies and memories of when things weren’t complicated.