There is no time to think or even process his words as my father has placed his arm into mine, and the aisle is before us. Classical music begins to play, and the guests rise from their chairs with judgment on their faces. My feet move on their own accord, lost in a hazy daze until Sebastian is standing before me, taking me from my father.
He looks handsome, dashing as always in his black tuxedo and perfectly placed bowtie.
But he isn’t Oliver.
He isn’t the man I love.
The minister begins to speak, and with my hands placed nervously in Sebastian’s, I scan the crowd until my gaze meets Aubrey and Chance. They both look well, Aubrey wearing a mauve chiffon dress, and Chance in a navy-blue suit with tie.
In a room of five hundred people, the only two people who feel like family are smiling back at me. As the minister continues his sermon about the sanctity of marriage, my mind wanders back to when I first met Chance and Aubrey.
My heavy suitcase dragged along the path, stopping just shy of the porch steps. The house looked weathered, perhaps rustic would be a more appropriate term to use.
“Hi,” a voice at the fence startles me. A female neighbor. “I’m Aubrey. This is CJ, my son. So, you’re staying here for the summer?”
I nodded, noticing the little boy playing in the yard with his ball.
“I’m Gabriella. And yes, just here for the summer.”
A small shaggy goat appeared beside the boy. I had to do a double-take.
A goat?
Here in Hermosa Beach?
How bizarre.
“You have a goat?”
“That’s Pixy.” Aubrey smiled proudly. “He’s also known as Esmeralda Snowflake or even, if you ever catch my husband around, Mutton or Bugger.”
“Hey, who you talking smack about?” A man walked out onto the porch. He had a thick head of copper hair, and the closer he walked toward us, his face became more apparent. Rather good looking with baby blue eyes and a chiseled jawline beneath his scruffy face.
“Chance, this is Gabriella, our new neighbor for the summer.”
“Nice to meet ya, Gabbie.” Chance extended his hand, his accent thick and not from around here.
I reached out to be polite and contemplated telling him I didn’t care for that nickname but decided to do that another time.
“Please excuse my husband and his need to abbreviate everything.” She motioned for me to lean in. “He’s Aussie. It’s what they do.”
“Oi,” Chance hollered from where he stood. “There’s a lot of things I do, princess, many of which you never complain about.”
“And please excuse his crass comments.”
I laughed, already liking the two of them.
“It’s a breath of fresh air,” I told Aubrey. “I think I’m going to like it here.”
Their support and ongoing friendship, despite my flaws and mistakes, means everything to me. Chance and Aubrey have always supported me from the moment I stepped foot next door. They never once judged me for my poor decisions, nor did they inflict their personal opinions on me. They welcomed me with open arms, and no one in my entire life has done that besides them.
A shot of confidence ran through me.
The only person’s opinion I should care for is my own.
If I don’t stand up for what I want, for who I want to become, then I might as well be dead.
Regardless of the eyes all heavily focused on me, when I stare back at Sebastian, my heart confirms what I have known on all along.
This will never work.
I can’t half give myself to someone. Even with his flaws, Sebastian deserves someone who will love him whole. That’s what love can do, it can bring out the strong version of you when you least expect it.
“I’m… I’m sorry, Sebastian. I can’t do this.”
He smiles through his teeth. “Gabriella, don’t be ridiculous. Everyone is watching.”
I pull his hand to follow me behind the screen covered in gardenias. The crowd gasps, whispers beginning, but I no longer afford to care what they think. This has to be about me, for once.
“Gabriella, are you fucking kidding me right now?”
“I don’t care. So they’ll watch us, judge us, and then they’ll move onto something else newsworthy. I care about you, but I can’t marry you. My heart doesn’t belong here.”
“Heart?” he seethes, eyes blazing at me. “It’s a goddamn marriage. Do you know how good we look on paper?”
“Paper,” I repeat, bowing my head. “But paper means nothing, Sebastian.”
I step off the backstage, hiding behind the pillars as the sounds of the crowd become louder. My parents both race toward me.
My father is anything but forgiving, towering over me ready to rein in his control with his stare deadly and ready to kill. “Gabriella, get back on that stage and marry Sebastian. How dare you humiliate us. If you walk away, you walk away with nothing. You understand me? You will be nothing to our family. I will make damn sure of that.”
The fear comes as crashing waves, those of a winter beach rather than with any warmth from a summer’s day. It comes as a chill that goes directly to the core of who I am, and it snarled, loudly, telling me to cower just like every other time. Yet, this time, I allow myself the strength to begin swimming, live in that salty water with my own bravery, and be the person I am destined to be. I need to conquer fear and accept my pain as lessons I need to master.
No matter what I do, I will never be good enough for my family, and that doesn’t matter anymore. I need to be the best for me because, in the end, that’s the only opinion which matters.
I know at this moment, defying my father will see me walk through the pits of hell to find my heaven or remain in a non-existent life for eternity.
I choose to walk through the fire.
“Then I choose to be nothing to you,” I tell him, holding his angered stare with my confident gaze.
“I never should have accepted you into this family. You were a mistake born out of a foolish betrayal.” He doesn’t say another word to me, demanding my mother to remove me from the property at this instance. My mother breaks down in tears, her scathing expression mirroring my father.
“A mistake born out of a foolish betrayal…” I repeat, lowering my voice. “I don’t understand?”
“Why did you have to do this? He gave you everything! He gave us everything. I’ve spent your lifetime paying for my mistakes,” she sputters, momentarily beyond words. “I don’t ever want to see your face again.”
Pulling her dress up, she storms off leaving me perplexed.
None of this makes any sense.
My father taking me in.
My mother’s mistakes.
Foolish betrayal.
Then it clicks, all his words, all my mother’s pleas, everything in my life up until this moment. I don’t belong here because I am not his—Edward Carmichael is not my father.
Sebastian has disappeared, he’s nowhere to be seen.