Chapter 24

To sayshe studies is probably one of the biggest understatements of her life.

She's not worried about math (numbers and equations she can memorize) or even her art appreciation final (because despite Mr. Kent's droning, she at least understands the material), but her literature class is close to killing her.

Seth, to his credit, is as tolerant as any reasonable person should be, but the last few weeks seem to have worn away at his patience. "No," he groans, eyes hidden behind his long fingers as he massages his temples. "That isn't even close to accurate."

Sara threads her hand through her hair, ready to pull at the short strands. "You said accuracy doesn't matter as long as I can support it!"

"That isn't support, it's drivel."

She stands, the kitchen chair screeching against the tile. She's too busy pacing the short span of her front room to care. "I hate this. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it." Grabbing the throw pillow from the couch, she screams into it before collapsing face-first onto the cushions. From around the fluff, she mutters weakly. "I really, really hate it."

Seth sighs, but the frustration in his voice has at least given way to pity. "I am well aware."

Sara turns her head, eyeing him miserably. "Why am I so bad at this?"

The shrug he gives is small, his hand coming away from his temple so he can face her fully. "Your mind is more suited for certainties—the black and white. Literature is about interpreting the gray areas, not memorizing facts."

"Well, don't hold anything back," she grumbles.

He huffs on a laugh, eyes warm. "You'll get it, Princess."

"No I won't."

"Hm, perhaps not. But, at the very least, we can work on improving your poker face."

She groans, flopping on her back and staring at the ceiling. "What does my poker face have to do with anything?"

"My dear, lie convincingly enough and you can turn any pile of bullshit into a passing grade."

Sara's not convinced (not even a little) but at this point she's got nothing left to lose.

Her heart isin her throat, pulse drowning in her ears and sweat lining her palms. The computer screen stares back at her, a click away from knowing if the last month of Seth's lectures were a waste of time or a saving grace.

Sara swallows down her nerves, wipes her hands on her jeans, and forces herself to click the link.

She passes her classes. All of them.

A strangled sound escapes her—the sheer amount of relief she feels is enough to make her cry. Her last semester would be the last two classes she needs to fulfill her bachelor of photography. No more math and no more literature.

She feels Seth hovering behind her, reading the posted results over her shoulder. When she looks, his lips quirk into a smile. "Well done, Princess."

Sara beams, leaning back in her chair to stare up at him. "Thank you. I couldn't have done it without your help."

His grin turns teasing. "That, I believe, we can safely agree on. Still, your efforts were commendable. Particularly when considering your complete lack of talent in the subject."

Sara's eyes narrow, trying (and failing) to look offended. "I think there was a compliment in there."

"Perhaps if you squint."

She laughs, her day bright, despite the gunmetal clouds gathering outside her window. For the first time in months, it feels like she's outrun her problems. She curls up on the couch, Oma's blanket draped over her lap and a mug of hot chocolate warming her hands as she rewatches The Princess Bride.

Silently, Seth's lips move in time with the dialogue. But if he's seen the movie enough times to be sick of it, he says nothing.

The next day she looks at the calendar, registers that Christmas is only five days away, and feels her mood sour.

"I really don't wantto go," she gripes, shoving a set of pajamas into a duffle bag.

Seth hums, distractedly staring out the window at something she can't see. He's felt distant the last two days—quiet in ways that she might find worrisome if it wasn't for the imminent holiday disaster she was facing. "Then don't."

"He's my father. And it's Christmas."

"More's the pity."

She could throttle him. "Are you even listening?"

Rolling his eyes, he gives her his full attention. "You realize we have had this exact conversation more times than I care to count? If you're truly that worried about your father's feelings, then just get in the blasted car and go."

She stares at him, momentarily thrown by his abrasiveness. Snarky, she's used to, but the abrupt way he dismissed her... "What's wrong?"

His jaw works, the way it always does when she's asked a question he wishes to avoid. "I have… some concerns," he admits, scowling. "It's nothing I wish to worry you with."

Sara doesn't miss the fact that he doesn't meet her eyes as he says it. "Why doesn't that make me feel better?"

"Perhaps because you have a penchant for worrying excessively over things in general."

She glares, arms folding across her chest. "Ok, seriously. Are you going to tell me what's going on?"

"Not if I can help it," he grumbles, shooting her a dry look. "And I would appreciate it if you'd refrain from asking."

Lips pursing, she regards him carefully. He meets her eyes unflinchingly, but there's a pleading edge in his gaze. Sara sighs, arms dropping limply to her sides. "You'd tell me, right? If it was something I should worry about?"

His expression softens. "Only once I'm sure it's worth worrying over."

"You know, somehow that's not all that comforting."

He doesn't answer and Sara doesn't push, even though she knows she could.

Sara goes home for Christmas.Mostly because she can't find a good enough excuse not to. She's ashamed to admit she half-wished for a snowstorm, but only got an inch for her trouble. Hardly enough to excuse her.

When she pulls in, there are no Christmas lights on the house, but she can see a tree through the front window. Sara can't remember the last time he brought a tree into the house, let alone decorated one, but the sight of it in the corner of the living room offers a thread of much needed hope. She grasps it, willing it to be a sign that the holiday with her father will offer more joy than heartache.

Even if things go badly, she tries to console herself with the fact that it's only two days—one night. She'll be back in her own home before Christmas Day is fully over. And, should things get too heated, there's nothing but her own stubbornness keeping her from taking her car and leaving.

Seth, unfortunately, doesn't seem to share her cautious optimism. "I still fail to understand why you're putting yourself through this."

Sara puts the car in park, turns off the engine, and makes a show of putting things in her purse—just in case her father happens to be watching from the window. "I don't need you to understand," she hisses. "I need you to be supportive."

Arms crossed over his chest, he tosses her a dirty look. "I'm merely reminding you that your last visit ended with you barreling down that sad excuse for a highway at nearly double the speed limit. I am nothing but supportive."

"Things are going to go better this time."

"How could you possibly know that?" His expression is skeptical, but there's a thread of curiosity that makes the words sound more like an honest question than a hypothetical one.

She nods towards the front window, hand pulling the door handle. "He put up a tree."

"How on earth does that—"

She shuts the door in his face, biting back a smile at the glare it earns her.

Now that she's out of the car, she can hear Belle barking from inside; the high pitched whine that she always does when she gets overexcited. The moment Sara opens the front door, the spaniel is a flurry at her feet—tongue licking at her hands and so full of energy she practically vibrates. Sara reaches down to pet her, but she's distracted by the changes in the rest of the room. There are a dozen little differences—the tidiness, the warm smell of a ham in the oven in place of sharp liquor, but it's the pressed button-down shirt and the tentative smile her father wears that makes her wonder if she's hallucinating.

"Hey, how was the drive?"

It takes her a moment to find her bearings. In her hand, the door knob is cold—a sharp contrast to the hot tongue licking at her fingers. "Um, good. Missed the traffic." It's an overused joke—outside of Des Moine there is no traffic. Gently, she shuts the door behind her, readjusting the strap of her purse. "The, uh, place looks nice. I like the tree."

Belle whines, demanding her attention, and Sara crouches down to give her the enthusiastic hello the dog is obviously begging for. Her hands bury themselves under the soft fur behind her ears. "And you look just lovely, Miss Belle!"

The dog flops over, belly up, and Sara scratches her stomach dutifully. It's a good distraction—an excuse to avoid meeting her father's stare and the sudden presence she can feel at her back.

"Well," Seth says, surprise underlying his sarcasm. "Perhaps there's hope for a Christmas miracle, after all."

Dinner isn'twhat she expects.

The food isn't half as good as what Oma used to cook up—the ham is dry, the potatoes lumpy—but she can taste her father's effort in every bite. When he offers her a drink, the only thing in a glass bottle is apple cider.

She can't remember the last dinner they shared sober. If it weren't for the stash of whiskey she found hiding behind the salad bowl, she would almost have hope that it could last.

From the head of the table, her father clears his throat. "So, what's Jen doing these days?"

Sara's hands pause in cutting her slice of ham, remembering the conversation that triggered their last argument. From his spot, draped over the plaid couch in the living room, Seth scoffs. Her first instinct is to be wary, to prepare herself for another round of disappointment, but her father's expression is earnest—anxious even—and she suspects he wants this dinner to go well as much as she does.

"She's been pretty busy… she's taking a trip to China in a few months. She's really excited about it," she offers, careful not to disclose that the reason she's been busy is actually because of wedding planning and that the trip to her home country is doubling as her honeymoon.

Roy nods, taking a drink of cider before returning to his utensils. "Her wedding's coming up soon, yeah?"

Sara stiffens, warnings going off like sirens in her skull. Through the noise, she hears Seth curse. She swallows, looking down at her plate—her hand gripping her fork so tightly, her knuckles are nearly as white as the paper plates. "Yeah, February."

"Odd month for a wedding, isn't it?"

"She wanted it during Chinese New Year."

She waits for the blowup, but when she risks a glance, he seems more awkward than angry.

"I'm, uh, sure it will be pretty. Jen's always had an eye for that stuff."

Sara blinks. "Um, yeah. Yeah, she has."

Another nod, and he fidgets with his fork. "And the groom's a nice enough fellow?"

Seth appears at her father's elbow, staring down at him with a perplexed frown. Sara looks back down at her plate to avoid the temptation to read the meaning between his furrowed brow.

"His name is Miles," she says. "We've become good friends."

Again, her father nods. "Good. That's good."

Seth's head tilts. The questions in his eyes match her own.

"Princess, wake up."

She groans, opening her eyes. Seth hovers over her. "Wha—"

He hushes her, a finger to his lips. "There's something I believe you should see, but you must be quiet."

Sara frowns, trying to rub the sleep from her eyes. There's one muddled question at the forefront of her thoughts, but there's an edge in his gaze that tells her not to ask.

To trust him.

Her chest tightens, a thread of fear winding around her heart. Nodding, she pulls the covers back and stands. Seth's eyes flit over her Santa themed pajamas with a hint of a laugh hiding at the corner of his mouth, but makes no comment. It's his silence that makes Sara's heart race as she follows him, quietly, out of her room.

Her father's on the back porch, which isn't all that unusual, but the open expression on his face is. She takes another quiet step closer and is alarmed to see a wetness to his cheeks. Then she registers his voice, low and deep, filtering through the cracked kitchen window, and stills.

"—old bat, and I blamed you for a whole lot of shit you weren't really responsible for, but I bet you're laughing up there now. Aren't you? How many times did you tell me, Gertie?" He looks at the unopened beer in his hands, thumb picking at the label. "How many damn times, and I still didn't listen." He sighs, a large hand running over his face as he looks across the horizon.

Sara feels her heart seize at the mention of her grandmother's name; a still healing wound scraped raw.

"I'm losing her. Just like you said I would. Have been for a long time, now, if we're being honest. I used to blame you for it—for taking her all the time. Hard to compete against real food and cookies, you know? It was an easy excuse. I know that now. You've only been gone a short time and I'm already seeing it. No one but myself to blame, though. Ain't that right?" He laughs, the sound strangled and wet, and presses his temple against the glass bottle in his grip. "Oh, Gertie. I've gone and fucked it all up."

His face is hidden from her, but Sara can see the way his shoulders shake—hear the soft gasping between hiccuped breaths. She's only ever seen him cry one other time in her life; a week after her mother left them and it became clear she wasn't coming back. It was late—hours past the time she should have fallen asleep. He had thrown his empty beer bottle down the driveway, screaming curses until he became hoarse. Sara watched from the window, frozen and terrified, as he sank to his knees, buried his face in his hands, and sobbed.

This is different. There's no anger in him tonight, no broken bottles, only resignation. Sara quietly slips away, drifting down the hall with her heart in her throat and an unsteadiness in her feet.

When she curls back up in her childhood bed, quilt pulled up to her chin, she whispers into the darkness. "Does it even matter?" Is being sorry enough, is loving her enough, when all her father's given her the past sixteen years are bruised memories?

"Yes," Seth says, voice soft.

Sara swallows, eyes tracing the slanted shadow of the blinds on the wall. Her father left the front porch light on. "He's never going to stop drinking." Because she knows, at the end of the day, that's the biggest thing standing between them. His anger—all the hurt that stems from it—is the symptom and not the disease. There's no filter when there's alcohol in his system; no empathy to rein him in from selfishness. Perhaps, if he were to stop—

No.

She won't let herself go down that road of what-ifs and maybes. He'll never quit, not long term, because he'll never bother to really try. Because, at the end of the day, that's the kind of person her father is: someone who will complain about everything being wrong but never step up to help make it right.

Seth sits on the foot of the bed. It's perturbing to see him perched there, but not feel his weight dipping the mattress. "No. I rather suspect he won't." He meets her eyes, sympathy in his gaze. "I'm sorry. I thought—" he cuts off with a shadowed laugh. "No, I suppose I wasn't thinking at all. Perhaps you're right. Perhaps it doesn't matter."

Sara curls into her pillow, thinking of the way her father's tears shone under the porch light and feels her chest tighten. Her father loves her enough to recognize the rift he's sown over the years, but not enough to fix it. Sara can't decide if that makes it better or worse.

She swallows thickly, gravel in her throat. Eyes burning, she blinks away the threat of tears and rolls over to face the wall. Her old country music poster, a remnant from her childhood, stares back at her with faded ink and curling edges. She used to listen to that album on repeat, wishing the happy songs resonated more than the sad ones.

"It matters," she whispers, voice cracking. "Just not enough."

"Fathers can be a right piece of work, I'm afraid. If it's any consolation, you're far from being the first person with daddy issues—certainly not the last."

There's a bitter edge to his tone that catches her attention. When she looks over her shoulder, he is staring through the slots in the blinds with a pensive frown. "Was yours?"

Seth turns to her, mouth twisting into a sneer. "A piece of work? Without question." He shrugs. "Though, I suppose it's unfair to complain, times being so different and all. I rather suspect you'd be hard pressed to find more legitimately happy families than miserable ones."

She sits up, back resting against the headboard and hugging her pillow to her chest. "You never talk about it." At his curious glance, she adds, "Your life before."

There's an almost imperceptible stiffening of his shoulders, but his expression remains neutral. "It's a long time gone. Hardly worth your time."

She doesn't believe that for a second, but the fact that he can say it means he does. Sara can't help but wonder if that's a reflection of his past or her. Either way, it coaxes a pang from her heart. Suddenly, it feels important that she know. "Will you tell me anyway?"

He hesitates. "Certainly, but… do you really wish me to? Truly?"

"Does that really surprise you?"

"Yes," he says, softly but without a hint of doubt. The tightness in Sara's chest grows, an aching pain. Seth must catch her flinch, because his expression changes into one of awkward embarrassment—hands sinking into his pockets. "It's only, well, no one has ever asked."

"Oh," she breathes, but the pressure in her chest doesn't lessen. If anything, it feels heavier. How could she be the only one, in all those hundreds of years, who cared enough to want to know? "Well, I am. And, you know, if you're ok with it, I'd like to hear about it."

He drags in a shaky breath, pulling his hands from the confines of his pockets and leaning against her dresser. "Very well then. Ask away."

She falters. "But if I ask, you'll have to answer."

Seth shrugs. "If you don't, I'll have no direction to begin."

Sara takes comfort in the relaxed line of his shoulders, the openly curious tilt of his chin. If their roles were reversed, she would be terrified, but Seth almost seems… eager. Still, she makes a point to keep her questions open enough for him to escape. "Did you have any siblings?"

"Unfortunately," he sneers. "Two older brothers. Both of them were utter pillocks." Glancing at her, seeing her awkward confusion, he rolls his eyes. "Idiots?"

"Oh." She shifts, picking at the seam of her pillowcase. "You didn't like having siblings?"

"Far from it," he glowers. "They were both over a decade my senior. By the time I came into the picture, our dear Father was already grooming them to be as heartless as he was. Carry on the family legacy and all that rot."

"Which was?"

Seth waves a flippant hand. "Managing the estate, overtaxing the tenants, making examples of the ones unable to pay. They were nothing but numbers on a page to him." His eyes harden, a sneer curling his mouth. "God forbid he see a person in the face of a peasant."

"So, regular grade-A asshole?"

"Precisely."

"And your brothers were the same way?"

"Worse," he says, the word spat with a level of contempt that surprises her. "Youth made them more ambitious."

Sara leans forward, chin resting on the end of her pillow as she processes what he's told her. She frowns. "But what about you?"

"What about me?"

"Your dad didn't want to teach you the family business?"

Seth laughs, the sound as bitter as it is harsh. "Goodness, no. I was the third son. Hardly worth the time when he already had two strapping young men ready to take over."

There's only one other family member she can think to ask about, but it takes her a moment to gather the courage. Sara thinks of her mother's red sedan, the dust and gravel it kicked up behind it. Sometimes she can almost taste it on her tongue, still choke on it. Her voice is little more than a hoarse murmur when she brings herself to ask, "What about your mother?"

His expression softens, his adoration so vivid it nearly makes her sick with envy. "Mother was… she was the only good thing in that family. My light. She was a poet, you know, and a fine one at that. Though no one ever cared to know it."

He goes quiet, soft smile dimming until it resembles more of a grimace. There's an old pain there, a regret, hiding in the furrow of his brow and the glassiness of his eyes. "I watched over her. From the day I became, well, this, to the day she died. I watched her suffer without me. Listened to her pray."

Sara's heart gives a sympathetic twinge. "Why didn't you answer?"

"I tried." His voice is level, but there's a reserved sort of agony tucked around the edges. A pain so deep, that even centuries worth of time were unsuccessful in completely smoothing the barbs. "Her only prayer was for my return. And, for however many times I tried, the magic refused to take."

Sara sucks in a breath, hands fisting in her pillow. Grief fills her, rising like floodwater the longer his words sit between them. Sorry is too soft a word, but she can't find any others, so she sits—lips parted around an apology she can't string together and her eyes burning with a sadness that isn't her own. "Seth…"

His hands are in his pockets again, fingers fiddling with the chain of his watch. "Don't fret over it, Princess. It was a long time ago."

That doesn't mean it ever stopped hurting, though, and in that moment—with the porch light casting slotted patterns across the room—Sara can almost see her pain reflected in his own.

Her mother abandoned her.

He abandoned his mother.

A mirrored image. Opposite, but somehow twisted into a pain so similar it hurts.

"What was her name?" Suddenly she needs to know. She'll never have a face for her, but she can have this. She can have a name.

For the first time in their entire conversation, there's a flash of hesitation before he laughs—breathy and full of secrets she doesn't understand. An inside joke she hasn't been privy to, not until he answers. "Sarah," he breathes. "Her name was Sarah."

His eyes catch hers, his smirk widening. "With an ‘h'. Naturally."