Chapter 15 Seamus
Chapter fifteen
Seamus
Icheck my watch. The library event begins in two minutes, and we're already inside the building, standing in the community room where chairs have been arranged in a semi-circle around art tables.
This is the first ERS-scheduled appearance that wasn't my natural territory—no corporate backdrop, no press.
Instead, I find myself surrounded by art supplies, children's books, and hand-drawn posters announcing "Free Community Sketch Night with Local Illustrator."
Rosanna moves through the space with easy confidence, greeting the librarian and adjusting the positioning of sketchbooks and pencils at each station.
She's wearing a paint-splattered cardigan over a simple dress. Her hair is pulled back in its usual messy knot. It's a stark contrast to the polished image from our press conference.
I remain near the wall, feeling conspicuously formal in my tailored slacks and button-down shirt despite having left my tie and jacket in the car at Tessa's insistence.
"You're not a CEO tonight," she had texted. "You're a supportive husband at a community event."
People begin to filter in. They are a mixture of children with parents, art students, and older adults with sketchbooks tucked under their arms.
I notice how they respond to Rosanna, their faces lighting up as she welcomes them.
No one approaches me directly, though many cast curious glances in my direction.
I recognize the looks of part intimidation, part speculation that have followed me for years.
The whispers confirm it: "That's him—the billionaire." "O'Malley." "Is it true they got married?"
I maintain my neutral expression, the mask I've perfected through countless uncomfortable situations.
Rosanna glances over at me, seeming to sense my discomfort.
She crosses the room with purposeful steps, taking my hand with a natural ease that must look convincingly affectionate to observers but startles me with its spontaneity.
"Come meet Eliza," she says, leading me toward an elderly woman setting up an elaborate pencil case. "She taught art at the community college for forty years and gives the best feedback."
Her hand is warm in mine, her grip unexpectedly strong for someone so small.
I let her pull me into her world.
***
Rosanna stands at the center of the room, demonstrating basic techniques with an ease born of long practice.
I sit slightly apart, a sketchpad balanced awkwardly on my knee more as a prop than a tool.
My artistic abilities are limited to stick figures which are nothing like the fluid, expressive lines Rosanna creates with seemingly effortless strokes.
I find myself watching her hands as she works. They are small, capable hands with short nails and a smudge of blue ink permanently embedded near her thumb.
Those same hands wave around expressively as she speaks.
She belongs here.
The group disperses to their individual tables to practice the techniques she's demonstrated, and Rosanna circulates among them, offering encouragement and gentle guidance.
She kneels beside a young girl with crayons, guides an older man's hand to show him how to create depth, and laughs with genuine delight at a teenager's cartoon rendition of the library mascot.
I remain in my seat, ostensibly working on my own sketch but actually studying her.
When she approaches my table, I resist the urge to cover the rudimentary landscape I've been attempting. She looks anyway, her head tilted slightly.
"You have an architect's eye," she observes. "You see the structure beneath things."
The assessment surprises me—not for its accuracy, but because it contains no judgment, only perception.
She picks up a pencil, demonstrating a technique for creating texture in the foliage I've drawn.
Her shoulder presses lightly against mine as she leans over the paper, and I detect the faint scent of lavender that I've come to associate with her presence in my home.
A young boy with glasses struggles with his sketch, his frustration evident in the way he repeatedly erases his work. Rosanna notices immediately and moves to his table, her approach gentle but direct.
"What are we working on here?" she asks, crouching beside him to view the drawing at his level.
The boy explains that he's trying to draw his dog but can't get the proportions right. Rosanna nods with complete seriousness, as if this dog portrait is the most important artistic challenge in the room.
"Drawing is all about how you see things," she tells him, guiding his hand through a simpler approach. "Sometimes we get caught up in what we think something should look like instead of what's actually there."
The boy's face scrunches in concentration as he follows her instructions, and gradually, a recognizable canine form begins to emerge on his paper.
When he expresses doubt about a particularly difficult section, Rosanna smiles and says something that makes me freeze mid-stroke: "Just keep it sunny side up! Every drawing has problems. The fun part is figuring out how to solve them."
The pencil slips from my fingers and rolls off the edge of the table. The sound is louder than it should be against the quiet scratch of graphite around the room.
"Sunny side up." Three simple words that I haven't heard spoken aloud in years, though I've read them countless times in emails from my pen pal Anna.
It is her signature phrase, her perpetual outlook.
I study Rosanna with new awareness, mental connections forming rapidly.
The murmur of conversation around me dulls.
She’s an artist. Runs literacy programs. Lives in Firth City.
And she uses the same ridiculous breakfast metaphor.
I should have recognized it sooner.
Rosanna is Anna.
My pulse kicks hard enough that I feel it in my throat. I set my sketchpad down carefully, because my hands are no longer steady.
My wife of convenience is the same person I've been writing to for most of my life.
If that is true, then everything I thought I understood about this arrangement is already obsolete.
I am not acting the part of an adoring husband.
I am standing in a library, watching the only person who has ever really known me.
I want this to be real.
I need proof.
While Rosanna continues working with students, I pull out my phone and open my email. I compose a quick message to Anna, "Just thought of you while observing an art class. Hope all is well."
I hit send and watch Rosanna over the top of my phone, waiting.
My thumb presses too hard against the screen. I force myself to breathe normally.
Less than thirty seconds later, her phone vibrates in her pocket. She pulls it out, glances at the screen, and a small smile touches her lips before she tucks it away again.
"Just my pen pal," she explains to the curious children around her. "I'll answer him later. Have you ever had a pen pal?"
My hand tightens imperceptibly around my phone.
Our situation has just become exponentially more complex.
For decades, our correspondence has existed separately from everything else in my life. It was a space where my words weren't weighted by my name or position.
Now those worlds have collided in a way neither of us anticipated, and I alone am aware of it.
I should tell her.
Yet something holds me back. It's an uncharacteristic hesitation that has nothing to do with business strategy.
Our emails are real in a way this marriage isn’t.
If I reveal the truth now, will she see it as another manipulation?
Or worse—will she stop writing altogether, eliminating the one authentic connection between us?
For the first time in years, I have no plan.
***
The ride home passes in silence, though not the uncomfortable tension of our earlier days together.
Rosanna sketches in the small book she always carries, occasionally looking up to observe the city passing outside the window. I review emails on my phone, responding to urgent matters while my mind continues processing the evening's revelation.
In the penthouse, we move through our evening routines. Rosanna makes tea in the kitchen while I review documents at my desk.
I find myself watching her more closely, cataloging nuances in her expressions. Like the particular way she tilts her head when considering a complex idea, the slight furrow between her brows when she's concentrating, the expansive gestures when she's enthusiastic about a topic.
Later, I sit in my study with my laptop open, staring at the email notification that arrived while we were still at the library.
Rosanna has responded to my message, continuing our correspondence as if nothing has changed because for her, nothing has.
But for me, everything has.
"Your timing is perfect, as always," she writes. "I've been thinking about perspective lately—how the same situation can look entirely different depending on where you're standing."
The irony of her statement isn't lost on me.
I need to know that she wants me, not just my resources or influence.
This marriage began as a transaction.
But for me, it's no longer possible to look at it that way.
And before she knows I’m Shay, I need to know how she feels about Seamus.