Chapter 73
Chapter Seventy-Three
Why did Shakespeare only write using quills?
—From Bash’s dad joke collection
Bash
Bash waited nervously backstage. Honor had personally arranged this impromptu interview with Liam Blum, a top-rated night-time talk show host she had a close friendship with.
A couple years ago, Brinder and Honor had each—without the other’s knowledge—arranged for a truly memorable appearance on his show to admit their love for each other publicly.
It had been a ratings bonanza, and Liam leapt at the chance to support Bash’s last-minute request.
It seemed only fitting, in this parallel craziness of faked relationships quickly turned real, that he take to the same stage as his sister and brother-in-law to set the record straight.
He, Slash, and Melody still hadn’t uncovered the leak.
Bash prayed fervently that it wasn’t Slash who’d betrayed him and Remy.
Alexis, Liam’s long-time producer, gave him the thumbs up. Behind the curtain currently shielding him from the live studio audience, Bash slipped into place. Hitting his mark, as he’d been trained to do unerringly.
He should’ve been nervous. Instead? He’d never felt lighter. It was time to show the world just how much he loved his queen.
“Welcome back,” Liam grinned at the camera. “My friends, I have a treat for you tonight. Our next guest is a theater-trained Shakespearean actor, known to all of us as the action-thriller star of his generation. And now filming his self-dubbed dream role.”
Murmurs rose in a wave from the audience, and Liam held up a hand. “Here with us tonight, to set the record straight on a recent brouhaha, help me welcome, Bash Wheatley.”
Loud applause and chattering filled the set as the curtain rose, revealing Bash alone on the stage, a sole klieg light illuminating him. He took a deep breath and launched into the monologue he still knew so well.
O mistress mine, where are you roaming?
O, stay and hear; your true-love’s coming,
That can sing both high and low:
Trip no further, pretty sweeting;
Journeys end in lovers’ meeting,
Every wise man’s son doth know.
What is love? ‘tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What’s to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet-and-twenty,
Youth’s a stuff will not endure.
Sebastian paused, letting the power of the moment carry him.
“That was my first major speaking role. Feste, from Twelfth Night. Performed, much to their reluctance”—he cocked his signature grin—“at my parents’ then-new theater.
” He turned to Liam, who was nodding and smiling.
“The thing about Feste is, while he’s a professional fool, he uses his charming wit to say things others dare not.
He is, arguably, the wisest character in the play, speaking truths others couldn’t. Or wouldn’t.”
He touched his wedding ring. “I am a fortunate fool. My wife—she loves clowns. Thinks they’re misunderstood and not at all creepy.
” He paused with perfected comedic timing, the audience laughing and absolutely with him.
“Sketchy taste in clowns notwithstanding, she loves this clown.” He brought a hand to his chest, which was heavy with emotion.
Keep it together. Keep it together.
“Arabella Remington is brilliant, and fierce, and accomplished. She heals where people are broken and in pain. She nurtures women and children who’ve faced appalling danger from people who violated their trust. And she loves with a depth and beauty that takes my breath away.
” He paused, pushing one shaking hand into his pocket.
“A lot has been said—erroneously—about my relationship with my wife and how it began. So let me set the record straight. I’ll tell you how it began.
“At twelve forty-five on what I thought would be an ordinary Friday afternoon in April, something far from ordinary happened. I met the love of my life. My fated mate. One look at her—bold and stunning and enticing as hell in her hospital scrubs”—he paused as the audience chuckled—“and I was done for. That was it.
“My entire life, I’d worried why I’d never fallen in love.
It used to stress me out, and I dated all the wrong people along the way trying to find it.
I ran away from relationship after relationship.
But Arabella Remington is a woman you don’t run away from.
You run toward that kind of magnificence.
Hard and fast. And that’s exactly what I did.
“And, for the very clear record, I’m going to spend the rest of my life loving her. Nothing can take that away from us. Also… Leave her the fuck alone. She’s a beast with a scalpel, saw, and drills.”
Applause and laughter filled the studio.
Bash smiled at the camera, imagining he was looking at Arabella. “I can think of no better way to wrap this than by sharing Feste’s last words in the play.” He proceeded to recite from memory.
A great while ago the world begun,
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain;
But that's all one, our play is done,
And we'll strive to please you every day
“Arabella Remington, my queen, as your liege man of life and limb, I will strive to please you every day. I love you.”
And as the stage faded to black, Bash grinned in the darkness.