“She’s persistent, your mother.” Helen eyed Sebastian as he snatched his phone out of his back pocket and shut the ringtone down. “Does she only call when we’re in the middle of addressing an issue between us, or at other times too?”
“No, my mother has a sixth sense and impeccable timing. She hasn’t called since that last time.”
Rememberingthat last timehad Helen treading carefully through the minefield of Sebastian’s past. “Are you going to your father’s memorial?”
“I don’t know. Probably not.” Sebastian looked torn, his eyes clouding with the scars he carried. Helen should heed it as a warning to back off but if she did, she’d be forever in the dark, always on the outside of Sebastian’s inner world.
“You feel like you should go, though, don’t you?” she said. “Because it’s the decent thing to do and you don’t want to be that guy who doesn’t attend his own father’s memorial.”
Sebastian ground his teeth, in the zone and ready to race. To run away. His shutters coming down fast. “I thought you wanted to talk aboutus?”
“We are.”Wow. She could practically see the sweat beading on his forehead when he said the wordus. And right there was the problem between them. “You said your parents put you off relationships. I appreciate how that can happen. Childhood shapes us, but it shouldn’t control us as adults and until you sort through your issues, no one stands a chance against them.” Helen leaned forward. “What would those therapists you’ve seen say about you not going?”
“They’d ask why, then they’d keep asking how I’d feel if I attended—and how I’d feel if I didn’t—until I drilled down to the core of the issue.”
Helen waited.
“Right.” Sebastian pursed his lips. “I see what you’re doing.”
“You don’t need to tell me what the core of the issue is, but you’re obviously not happy aboutnotgoing, otherwise it wouldn’t cause you so much stress. When is it?”
“Thursday. My mother’s assistant has booked me a flight for tomorrow evening, returning Saturday so I’ll be back for the last event.”
“Are Michael and Brenda happy for you to go?”
Sebastian nodded. “Now that Mikey is back from his paternity leave, my schedule isn’t as busy and I can check email and take calls in Ottawa.”
“So all you have to do is step on a plane?”
“Yeah. That’sallI have to do.” He let out a shaky laugh. “Other than sit through a memorial celebrating the life of a man I barely knew and watching my mother play the grieving widow in front of a bunch of politicians who are still pissed at me for what happened in Vegas.”
Sebastian ran his hand through his hair. There was something else too, but he looked so uncomfortable, Helen gave him time to adjust. That door to his inner world was rusty and unused. He’d cracked it open a little but it could shut at any time.
Trapping her fingers, and her heart, inside.
Lying alone on the grass after dinner, Seb stared at the evening sky.
“You need to take that flight tomorrow night.” Wearing a hoodie over her nightshirt, Helen came to lie beside him. “If you don’t go, your wounds will fester. You need the closure.”
Bam!
The rebel fairy strikes again, kicking his feet from under him, flooring him with the truth of what he needed to do.
Seb puffed out his cheeks. “Yeah, you’re right.”
Helen shifted to lie on her front, resting on her elbows as she looked down at him. “Is there something else going on back home, other than the memorial?”
How did she do that, lift the lids on his neat little boxes, one by one?
Seb surrendered to her powers. “I have to help clear out my father’s study. My mom came out with some bullshit about not being strong enough to do it on her own, like it means something to her, but I think it’s her way of making me attend.”
“I still haven’t gone through Ada’s things. Grief is a strange beast, Sebastian. Maybe your mother is too sad to go through your father’s stuff?”
Celeste? Sad?
No. That wasn’t the case at all. Helen didn’t understand how it was with him and his parents. If she did—if he explained the way he was made—she’d also understand why he wasn’t cut out for relationships.
But where to begin?
