Chapter 26:
Beyond the blurriness, Lacey’s beautiful abode never failed to amuse Sebastian.
It has been some time. I has been some period. I forgave him. But, is it idiotic for me to still lie on his bed and think we can be a happy family with a daughter? Sebastian sighed as he firmly sat on the bed and pushed the duvet out of his grasp. He rubbed his face and ignored the pangs of pain under his bruises.
His vision a blur, his lips a dried sanctuary of passion, Sebastian cried as everything fell into place. All landed on the oblivious stage of confusion where the marquee blinked and the curtains an array of iridescent colors, trying to please all the eyes. On that stage, he sang his song but to only reverberate and echo to nothingness, creating discord. Sebastian’s sob echoed but it seemed unadulterated. Is sorrow the only thing for me?
“Good morning!” Lacey exclaimed as he bombastically entered the room.
Sebastian gave him a tired smile.
“Why?” Lacey scrutinized after laying the breakfast-on-bed exhibition. He scooted near Sebastian until their hips made contact with each other. Lacey breathed on his neck and inhaled the scent of the Betadine flustering his morning bliss.
Sebastian sighed and crumpled his face with his own rough palm.
“I love you,” Lacey muttered. “I am sorry and if I would be given forever, I would be apologetic in that whole infinity. Sebastian, I am sorry. T-That night w-was… was blur! I did not—”
Sebastian hushed him. He gently laid his finger on Lacey’s dried lips and trailed its edge. “You need lip gloss before I kiss you. I love you too.”
Lacey smiled. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry too,” Sebastian confessed.
“You’re hurt because of me.”
“I’m hurt because I love you and if I will be given your forever, I’ll make that period suppressed by my care than your apologies. I love you, Lacey. Although, you hurt me twice, you love me more than once. It is enough for me to trust my last years to you.”
“I love you. You are the greatest thing that happened in my life,” Lacey said with relief. “You’re my angel. My hero,” he proclaimed and kissed him. “Can I just wet it? You know? My lips?”
Sebastian smiled and plummeted his lips into Lacey’s. “I will love you no matter what. You are as sweet as an orange, redhead,” he breathed.
Breakfast in bed had been great. Sebastian had never taken it shirtless. Always under his pajamas with Hello Kitty designs. He brushed his chest clear of sweat and ran his fingers through Lacey’s curls and as his hand escaped the autumn jungle, he grabbed his fork and sliced the pancake in half.
“Burnt again?” Sebastian teased and Lacey blushed.
“I love burnt things don’t worry,” he continued and patted Lacey who lay on his lap wrapped with the duvet.
“Maple syrup not needed. The pancake beams with enthusiasm upon its unadulterated bitterness.” Sebastian chuckled.
The white duvet made him feel sanctuary. Inside that soft linen, he was safe. He was alive and immaculate. And before him was a seamless pair of pure rings burning with ardent passion. Juxtaposed between was a cherry. Aphrodisiac. Sebastian sighed and fondled with Lacey’s nose. He loved it. It looked like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer sleighing on the white landscape. Sebastian clutched his hand over his chest as the building tremor shook his hand then throughout his body. Lacey quickly got up and watched Sebastian writhe in pain.
“S-Sebastian!” he stuttered and shrieked. “H-Help!” he screamed and pulled a white shirt from his desk and cloaked Sebastian with it. He grabbed his jacket in a nanosecond scooped Sebastian form the bed.
“You’ll be fine,” he assured as they went out of the house. “Call an ambulance!” he ordered as the door of his house burst open.
Sebastian’s thoughts were flying. His gaze from his spot directed to Lacey’s chiseled chin, his bust puffing from muscles. He huffed and tried breathing normally but his senses were sliding away from his grip. Absurdly, his determination to convince himself that he’d be fine faded. He wanted to get hold of his body once again but he, as if, already fell down a chasm. However on that abyss, Lacey was a never ending scenery bordered by red cliffs and boulders. In minutes, the redness just got denser… and denser… suing to black. Pitch black.
Ethan gave her a confused look. He creased his eyebrows and curved his lips into a skeptic line to emphasize his startlement.
“For what agendum, Becky?” Ethan inquired and anticipated for her explanation. Instead she had given him her words, Becky dragged him with the drastic current of the mob. Ethan realized his obliviousness. He bestowed the control over his body to Becky and let her pull him to any way she thought safe. Ethan huffed and firmly hand-ironed his suit again.
“We need to evacuate this place first. Second, I have to fetch some stacks of paper and by then you can go in The Japanese Pride with me tomorrow,” Ethan assured.
“Ethan…” Becky started. “I must see him before I fly back to New York. I—”
“Where did you get his picture? If you don’t mind me having that imperative.” Ethan scrutinized as they walked.
“You left this on the bench so I fetched it. His picture fell down and… I picked it up!” Becky enthused.
Ethan opened the door of the nearest convenient store and the wind chime giggled. “Two small cups of espresso,” he ordered to the cashier and turned to Becky. “Now for the agendum,” Ethan questioned after getting his espresso and handing the other one to his companion.
Becky gulped as her skinny feature showed tension on her neck. “I think you figured it out yet.”
“I need verification,” Ethan recoiled. “Etymologically, I realized the irony on the similarity of your and his name. Japanese versus French. Would I consider it coincidental? Yes. Could I consider it intentional? Why should I not ask you? Is he your father?”
“Genius,” Becky stated.
“A not so dramatic introduction. Really?” Ethan shifted his tone. “Well tell me that the ‘cosplay’ is a lie.”
Becky nodded and sipped her coffee.
...
The International Clippings Challenge had left before Becky entered the room. Everything was moronically classy. However, she was enthralled. The snow showed coldness and sophistication. Although out of place, it added some spotlight. Becky adjusted her excoriating volume and roamed the room. She noticed a paper dangling on a thumbtack with a bunch of names written on it.
International Clippings Challenge Board of Judges:
A cluster of names drew themselves in alphabetical order. German, French, Japanese names she wasn’t familiar with seemed to attract her eyes.
Utsukushii Rosa
Becky examined. Japanese. CEO of The Japanese Pride. She was skeptic. Translated from Japanese to French, it literally means Beautiful Flower or Belle Fleur. She straightened her poise and snatched the paper away from the tack. She ran outside, exasperated of what she wanted and needed to find out.
…
“I booked my flight on the day you had yours. I wanted to make sure that my itinerary would direct to him. Not to a cosplay event but to him. I want to find out if he truly is my father.”
Ethan warmly smiled.
“Why?” Becky intriguingly asked him.
“Why why?” Ethan asked back.
“I wanted to slap this to his face!” Becky’s tone outraged as she stood up and in an instant, her body was cartography of red lacerations, punctures and contusions. Becky’s face bloomed in rose red anger. Her face had color for the first time. It seemed to be the spring of a new beginning.
“Too late for second guessing. It’s time to trust my instincts. I must show this to him so he’ll know how much my mother and I suffered when he left us,” she infuriated until it became a show people enjoyed in the convenience store.
Ethan inhaled out of fear and startlement. He stood and held her by her shoulders. “Becky, no. It won’t cost you nor it will benefit you. You’ll just hurt someone.”
“Well he deserves it!” she countered with her black-drawn eyebrows aimed at him like arrows. Ethan sighed. “Becky… I don’t know what you mean but I know what that raucousness will make you pay.”
“Well fuck this shit, Ethan. If you won’t help me get through The Japanese Pride peacefully, I guess I have to force my way inside!”
“Help you or not, the outcome is still undesirable!”
“For you!”
“For your father!”
Becky glared at him. “Well he must be thankful I still consider his existence. If not, I would have brought a gun there and shot him in head so that he’d know the pain processed by his pettily smart mind. He doesn’t have a heart. He left me in front of a bar where my mother saw me and raised me. Ethan, you don’t know…” she cried. “You don’t know…”
Ethan welcomed her to his embrace but she was oblivious. He leaned forward and hugged her. The first few seconds were immaculate. It was pure as she continued to sob like a fatherless little girl but as the tears soaked on Ethan’s blazer, she pulled away and glared at him like a crone.
The crone…
“Becky, wait!” Ethan yelled and chased her out of the store. “Hey!”
Becky was running fast down the sidewalk, against the mob’s current. Ethan looked for a bicycle but he found none. Instead it was the helpless crone he saw earlier. She was walking slowly on the sidewalk, crying still. She was wiping her tears with the picnic carpet she had herself. She was mouthing a tirade that Ethan could not perceive to understand. Ethan looked to Becky’s direction again. She was crossing the curve. Ethan heavy heartedly turned away from the crone and chased Becky instead.
As he ran down the sidewalk, policemen in their cars screeched the streets. Ethan halted. The crone…
He turned around and a commotion grew beside an old woman’s body lying on the ground, lifeless. Goosebumps crawled on his skin. He fell on his knees, crying.
Enid’s heart palpitated as she closed the door of her apartment. Her mollified knees gave up from her weight and she glided down to the floor. Fear rushed inside her body like an igniting bomb. She rushed to her mirror and convinced herself that what happened was fictitious.
Her hands frantically raced through her dense hair and massaged her scalp. Her weak knees stroke again and she fell on the floor. Enid helplessly clutched her fist on her chest until she could finally regain her breathing. There was silence but her pants. She exhaled and the phone rang.
The shock paralyzed her for a few second until she gripped the phone and tried to casual address the caller.
In choppy voice, it said, “Enid, this is Lacey. Go to the hospital near NYAAS. Sebastian had a convulsion.” It ended in a ping. It flabbergasted her. Sebastian.
Enid pushed the glass door open to a harvest green hospital room and the red curls of Lacey Asshole from the Douchebag kingdom. Enid stood there for a moment as she saw nothing but a devil with seductive circular vines that choked Sebastian.
“You…” she loudly whispered and rampaged toward him. “You!” she shrieked and vigorously attacked him with random slaps and arrogant hand slashes. “What did… you do?” she scrutinized under her arduous circumstance of fighting him.
Lacey held her back and firmed her on her spot. She bolted out of his grip and ferociously slapped him. “What did you do to him?”
Lacey grimaced. “What did you do?” Enid cried and collapsed on Lacey’s chest. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “Where is he?”
Lacey patted her head and brushed it. He cried. “He’s fine… He’s fine. He’s in good hands,” he assured and kissed her scalp. Enid snuggled on his chest. She gained comfort. It was a convenient spot. It was warm and loving. How she wished she could have something like that. A person who’d balance her life into a fair equilibrium.