The Aftermath // Sebastian Sallow x MC

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐲 𝐎𝐧𝐞 - 𝐂𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬

ᴛᴡ: ʜᴀʀꜱʜ ᴀɴᴅ ᴇxᴘʟɪᴄɪᴛ ʟᴀɴɢᴜᴀɢᴇ, ʀᴇꜰᴇʀᴇɴᴄᴇ ᴛᴏ ꜱᴀ ᴀɴᴅ ᴀʙᴜꜱᴇ

When I woke up that morning, trapped in bed between the arms of the man that I loved, my life seemed normal – even if it lasted just for a moment. A life where I was safe, where I didn't have the weight of the world on my shoulders, or powers, that I didn't know where they came from or even how to control them, that jeopardised every plan of mine, every project.

It seemed, for a moment, as I slowly opened my eyes and realised that he was awake, and that he was looking at me with smiley eyes, that it was a life in which I should not be constantly afraid: to be discovered, to be found, to be captured and tortured, or just scared of not being enough, of never being fully happy.

At that moment, none of that existed in my mind. All I could see was him, his loving eyes, his freckles, his messy hair, and I felt something I hadn't felt in a long, long time.

Hope.

"Stop staring at me while I sleep," I whispered with my raspy voice, smiling; "it's disturbing."

"Oh, really?" he replied, laughing. With his fingertips, he pulled a curl from my forehead to the back of my ear. "Well, I can't. You're too pretty."

"You're obsessed with me" I responded, laughing back, and turning away from him.

He grabbed me by the waist with his arm, clutching me towards him. "How could I not be?"

As he left a trail of kisses behind my ear to my shoulder, I let myself be intoxicated by his perfume on the sheets, by the warm feeling of his body behind mine, and if the future would have let me have this still I knew it would have been a future that I would have guarded jealously and worth living.

Yet, I knew that this idyll, this fictional abode that we had created within the Room of Requirement, was nothing but a postponement of what was now inevitable. What had to be done.

"We need to talk", I murmured, grateful to be turned away from seeing his expression change. I knew that he thought it was too soon, that we should have waited a little longer, yet living with the weight of what I had to do in my chest every day was starting to become unmanageable.

What started as a journey to discover myself and my origins, had become something dark and twisted, something horrible that had to be avoided at all costs. And, as worried as I was that Sebastian wasn't going to approve, it wasn't the first time in my life that I had to put myself after the greater good. Maybe it was in my nature, or maybe it was just a symptom of my peculiar experience, but I couldn't move on with my life until everything that was happening would be resolved.

Sebastian sighed, while caressing my breastbone with his thumb. "I know."

"You know if I could, I'd stay here with you for a while longer," I muttered, nervously pinching the pillow cover between my fingers, "but we need to finish this, whether we like it or not."

"I know, Elizabeth. I know", he breathed in my ear with a regretful voice, "I'm just afraid."

For some reason, his words hit me right in my guts, causing a feeling of tightness. I was scared too, even though I wouldn't admit it: part of me thought that if I showed myself being too vulnerable in front of him, I would only give him more worries. Yet, the fear we both felt was more than justified: what was waiting for us was bigger than us, and we were more than aware of who the man who was after us was.