“There was this girl in the hospital, an ordinary girl. She was dying, I think, and there wasn’t much the doctors could do.”
“And?”
My hands were tight on the wheel. “I worry about her every night. I’m afraid for her. Sebastian, I care about her.”
“Oh,” was all he said.
In silence, we went through Upper Falls, along the old brickyards, then by the oak tree where Cyrus and I had crashed. You could still see the gouges in the bark, like the claw marks of some giant bird.
“One more confession before we get home,” he said. “Freshman year, I looked up my birth family.”
“Your…” It took a moment for the words to click.
I’d always known that Sebastian had parents who weren’t Mortons, imprisoned for their blood-soaked crimes, leaving him in the foster system to be rescued by us.
But a family? Aunts and uncles? Strangers who called himcousin?
To me he’d been a foundling: appearing from nowhere, the rival and ally I hadn’t known I needed.
“I have a twin sister, a younger brother.”
“A twin?” I remembered him playing the twin game with Gertie when we were little. Trying to play it with me. “There’s someone out there who looks like you?”
“A softer version. Desiree never had my rage.”
I shook my head. The world had no other versions of Sebastian.
He pointed ahead at Orrin, waiting for us at the gate. Confessions were over.
“One last thing,” he said. “Do you forgive me too? In advance?”
“Yes. For what though?”
He didn’t answer.
47
Mary Morton, seventh of her name, performed her mors curae on the grounds of the family estate, in the burned-out husk of the chapel.
As Sebastian and I approached the ruin, a full moon etched our shadows on the ground. The sky was clear, and it was close to midnight.
It had been five years since the fire. Fallen stones lay jumbled on the ground, worn smooth by rain, wildflowers sprouting between them. The remaining columns were still marked by smoke. The old steeple stood tall, braced by weathered wooden beams.
“Someone should get married here,” Sebastian said.
“Trotsky’s wearing white.”
“Not for long.” His smile was half-hearted.
We hadn’t spoken much since I’d picked him up the day before—not a word about our confessions, or his other family.
He looked grim, like he was the one killing a rabbit today.
“A flask to mark the occasion,” I said, pulling it out. Granduncle Otto’s from the 1920s, glass with a leather wrap. The brass cap shone in the moonlight.
“Thought booze didn’t go with your pills.”
“This one’s for you.” I handed it to him. “An Old Gal with Georgia Heartwood whiskey.”
