But as I look at their faces, at the grief mixed with relief, I know without a shadow of a doubt that was never the case.
I let dark thoughts infest my head and drag me into the black hole of self-hatred. And in doing that, I failed to see just how much I mean to these people. How the thought of losing me has left them shell-shocked and unrecognizable.
I never thought my larger-than-life father would look to be on the verge of collapsing because of me. And I want to hug him. I want to tell him how grateful I am to have him.
But first…
“What…” My words get stuck in my throat and I gulp before I look at Mum. “What about your exhibition? I ruined it, didn’t I?”
“Fuck that. I don’t need it or my whole career as long as I have you, Bran. I need you to know that.”
I hug her then, burying my face in her neck, trembling in her hold. “Thank you, Mum.”
“No, thank you for coming back to me, hon. Thank you…thank you…”
Dad pats my back and Glyn leans on my shoulder as she cries softly, her body shaking.
And I know, I just know I’ll be fine as long as I have them.
It’ll hurt.
But it won’t be as painful as hiding myself from them.
It’s time I properly say the words I should’ve shouted eight years ago.
I pull away from Mum’s embrace and suck in a sharp breath. “Mum, Dad. I have something to tell you.”
“Anything, son.”
“I think I need help. Please help me get better.”
I spent what seems like hours spilling my guts to my parents and Glyn. Everything that I couldn’t say before, everything that I buried in my chest and swallowed down with air.
There was a lot of crying and hugs, but I didn’t feel sad afterward, no. More like hopeful and light. As if I finally breached the surface of the inky lake I’ve been drowning in for eight years.
Dad said he’s pressing charges of sexual assault of a minor against Grace, and Mum said she’ll have her banned from the arts council that she currently presides over. She’ll have her stripped of her peer title in the House of Lords and drag her through the mud.
The thought of courts and a legal process gives me a headache, but I want justice.
I want to finally give fifteen-year-old me what he always wanted—justice—and hope that one day, he’ll forgive me.
He’ll one day look at me in the mirror and smile. Even if only once.
I know it’ll take time and a fuck ton of therapy, but I can wait. He waited for me to catch up for eight years, the least I can do is be patient as he leaves the cave I shoved him into for so long.
Earlier, I spoke to the therapist the NHS sent me and it was hard, but I blurted the words out.
I want to get better not only for myself, but also for the man I love.
The man who’s nowhere to be found. Dad told me Nikolai is the reason I’m alive. He’s the one who kept the pressure on my neck as if his life depended on it and carried me to the car before they drove me here.
He stayed for the entire seven hours of the operation, but apparently, he left as soon as they were told I was stable.
Thinking about the possibility that he wants nothing to do with me makes me jittery.
It’s why I did what I did in the first place. The thought of him seeing me differently and hating me gave me that shove over the edge.
I stare at Glyn and she smiles as she cuts me some avocado. Dad is talking to the police. Mum is with the doctors.
But my sister refuses to leave my side.
“I don’t suppose you know where my phone is?” I ask.
“Nope. But you can use mine.” She unlocks it and passes it over.
“Thanks.”
I type Nikolai’s name and call him. The longer the phone rings in my ear, the louder my heart thumps.
My chest falls when it goes to voicemail. He doesn’t check those—ever. I don’t know why he even has the service.
“You mean I could remove it?” is literally what he replied when I asked him that once.
“I’m sure he’ll come around.” Glyn offers me an encouraging look. “I’ll kick his arse if he doesn’t…or maybe like send Kill because he’s really scary.”
I smile and give her back her phone.
The door opens and I look up, hope blossoming in my chest with a force that hurts.
But that’s the thing about hope, it exists to be crushed.
It’s not Nikolai who walks in.
My disappointment is short-lived, however, when my eyes clash with my identical ones. I gulp, my heart swirling in a puddle of my own humiliating feelings that I confessed to my parents not too long ago.
I wanted to ask about Lan, but I didn’t dare to. A part of me is relieved that he’s here. The part that held on to the fact that he does care, even if everyone said he didn’t.
His face looks the most distraught I’ve ever seen. Lan doesn’t do emotions. At all. I thought the only exception was Mia, but as I stare at his worn-out gaze and the lines of relief around his eyes, I think maybe I was wrong.
“You okay?” he asks as he stops beside me. His voice isn’t right. It’s too careful. Too restrained. Definitely does not fit the Lan I knew my entire life.
I nod.
“Glyn, get out,” he says.
“No.” Her gaze is alarmed as she looks at me.
“It’s okay,” I say with a smile. “Go.”
She gives me an unsure glance before she hugs me and narrows her eyes on our brother. “You better not say anything funny, Lan.”
He doesn’t reply or even look at her. His intense attention remains on me until the door closes behind her, his hand curling and uncurling into a fist.
“You’re going to punch me for daring to hurt your identical twin?” I try to joke to break the tension.
That only manages to make a vein throb in his neck, nearly popping from the skin. “I’d kill for you, I’d shoot myself if that makes you breathe better without me shadowing you, but I’d never…ever hurt you, Bran.”
My lips part and I stare at his tight expression and know that he means every word.
“I was kidding,” I breathe out.
“Don’t joke about shit like that. Your life is not a fucking joke. Fuck!” His chest rises and falls in heavy succession and I’m seriously scared he’ll pop a vein or have a stroke.
I shift in the bed, the injury in my neck burning and itching for some reason. “Lan—”
“I’m sorry.”
The words nearly split me open. It’s different to hear that from Mum and Dad or even Glyn, but this is Lan. He never, ever apologizes. Not even when he nearly drove Mia away for good.
I thought I’d come down from the emotional high, but they rush back to the surface until my own chest is heaving.
Our harsh breaths echo in the damn hospital room that witnessed me at my lowest.
“What are you sorry for?”