enjoyebooks CHAPTER 137
CHAPTER 137
POV: Evangeline
I am folding linen when I hear them laughing.
Not politely. Not carefully. Real laughter—Mark’s bright and careless, Adrian’s quieter but present. It carries down the corridor like something alive, something unafraid.
I stop mid-fold.
For a moment, I simply stand there with the sheet gathered in my hands, afraid that if I move, the sound will vanish.
Then I hear Adrian say, “You’re impossible,” and Mark reply, “You love it,” and the laughter comes again.
I exhale.
Later, when they pass my doorway, I step out. “What’s amusing you?”
Mark grins. “Adrian admitted he can’t swim very well.”
“I said I don’t like swimming,” Adrian corrects.
“You said you panic,” Mark says cheerfully.
“I did not—”
I raise a hand. “Enough. You’re both alive. That’s miracle enough.”
They smile at each other, something eased between them that wasn’t there before.
When they leave, I remain in the corridor, heart full and aching all at once.
When the sun settles, I sit with Sebastian in the small sitting room—the one without thrones, without ceremony. Just chairs worn soft by use.
“They’re better,” he says.
“They’re healing,” I correct.
He nods slowly. “I don’t know how you see it so clearly.”
I look at my hands. “Because I’ve seen what happens when it doesn’t happen at all.”
He waits. He’s learning to do that.
“My father believed love was a reward,” I continue. “Given when earned. Withdrawn when inconvenient.”
Sebastian’s jaw tightens. “You’ve told me.”
“I know,” I say. “But I don’t think you knew what it did to me.”
He doesn’t interrupt.
“I learned early that staying meant obeying,” I say. “That being chosen meant being quiet. That if I didn’t cause trouble, I wouldn’t be discarded.”
“You were never—” he begins.
“I was,” I say gently. “Just not loudly.”
I look toward the window, where the palace gardens glow softly under lantern light.
“My brother was different,” I continue. “He felt too much. Loved too recklessly. And when he ran, my father decided someone had to pay for it.”
Sebastian turns fully toward me now.
“I became the solution,” I say. “The replacement.”
“You became my wife,” he says softly.
“Yes,” I reply. “And I don’t resent that. But I need you to understand—when our sons fight, when they choose differently, when one steps back and the other steps forward…”
I meet his eyes. “I know exactly how fragile that moment is.”
He nods once. “Adrian chose to step back.”
“Yes,” I say. “And that choice could have broken him. Or it could have freed him.”
“And you think it freed him,” Sebastian says.
“I know it did,” I reply.
***
I find Adrian later that night in the library.
He looks up when I enter, closing the book he wasn’t reading.
“You’re awake late,” I say.
“So are you,” he answers.
I sit beside him. “How are you?”
He hesitates. Then: “Lighter.”
I smile. “That’s a good word.”
“I don’t feel like I disappeared,” he adds. “I thought I would.”
I reach for his hand. “You didn’t lose yourself.”
“I chose,” he says.
“Yes,” I agree. “And that matters.”
He looks at me carefully. “Was it always like this for you?”
“With your brother?” I ask.
He nods.
“No,” I say honestly. “I didn’t choose. Things happened to us. And we spent years paying for them.”
His grip tightens slightly. “I don’t want that.”
“You won’t have it,” I say firmly. “Not like we did.”
He studies my face. “You’re sure?”
“I stayed,” I say.
He frowns. “Stayed?”
“I stayed,” I repeat. “When it would have been easier to disappear. When it would have been safer to harden. I stayed soft.”
He considers that. “That sounds painful.”
“It was,” I admit. “But it’s why you’re sitting here now, able to choose love instead of fear.”
He smiles faintly. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For not turning into him,” he says.
I close my eyes briefly.
Mark corners me the next morning.
Not literally—he’s not subtle enough—but he hovers until I ask, “What is it?”
“I don’t deserve him doing that,” he says.
“Deserve what?” I ask.
“What Adrian did,” he replies. “He gave something up.”
“He didn’t give it up,” I say. “He gave it to you.”
“That’s worse,” Mark mutters.
“No,” I say gently. “That’s love.”
He scowls. “That’s pressure.”
“It doesn’t have to be,” I reply. “Only if you waste it.”
Mark looks down. “I won’t.”
“I know,” I say. “Because you were raised by someone who stayed.”
He looks up. “You mean you?”
I nod. “And your father is learning to stay too.”
He exhales slowly. “Good. Because I don’t want to lose either of them.”
“You won’t,” I promise.
***
I walk alone through the eastern garden.
I remember being fourteen, standing at a window very much like this one, watching my brother walk away without looking back. I remember thinking love was something you survived, not something you kept.
I was wrong.
Love is something you practice.
I stop by the small stone bench near the fountain—the one Alexandro used to sit on, kicking his heels into the water while telling me impossible dreams.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I couldn’t save you.”
The water ripples gently.
“But I saved them,” I add.
Sebastian finds me there.
“You all right?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say. “I am.”
He sits beside me. “I was thinking… maybe we don’t need such strict schedules for the boys. Maybe we let them be… boys.”
I smile at him. “Look at you.”
He huffs softly. “Don’t mock me.”
“I’m proud of you,” I say.
He looks away, embarrassed. “I’m trying.”
“I know,” I reply.
***
That night, as the palace settles into quiet, I stand in the doorway of my sons’ shared sitting room. They are bent over a board game, arguing amiably.
“That move is illegal,” Adrian says.
“It absolutely is not,” Mark replies.
“It violates three rules.”
“Rules are suggestions,” Mark grins.
I clear my throat. “Bed.”
They groan in unison.
As they pass me, Mark says, “Goodnight, Mother.”
Adrian adds, “Thank you.”
“For what?” I ask.
“For staying,” he says.
When the door closes, I lean against the frame, heart aching with something like relief.
I did not repeat my father’s lesson.
I did not choose silence.
I stayed. And because I stayed, love learned how to stay too.