Chapter 20 #2
But I’m not a lifeline. I’m the anchor that could drag him down to my messy, unfiltered world of cargo planes and snow globes.
“Go,” I say, forcing a smile. “Your hair really needs professional help.”
“We still need to talk.” His eyes hold mine, searching for something I can’t afford to give.
“Sebastian, darling! Thank God!”
A woman sweeps in, her heels clicking against the linoleum in perfect rhythm, each step a declaration of status.
My heart sinks into my stomach as Sebastian’s whole body language changes in a single heartbeat.
His spine straightens like someone’s attached invisible strings, his shoulders square, and just like that, my Sebastian disappears behind Mr. Lockhart’s perfect mask.
The transformation is so complete it steals my breath, like watching someone vanish before my eyes.
“Mother.” His voice has that polished edge again, the one that made me want to yell at him when we first met. “I wasn’t expecting—”
“When my son disappears in Alaska with some...pilot, did you think I’d just sit at home?” She says “pilot” the way most people say “cockroach.”
His mother’s gaze slides over me, each flicker of her eyes cataloging my deficiencies—borrowed hospital clothes hanging off my frame, hair that hasn’t seen shampoo in days, the complete absence of anything that might suggest value in her world.
“This is the...person who crashed your plane?” she asks, each word delivered with surgical precision.
My cheeks burn hot enough to melt snow while my fingers twist into the borrowed scrubs that hang from my frame like a discount Halloween costume.
A rebellious strand of hair flops across my vision for the hundredth time, tangled with what’s definitely a pine needle—a tiny souvenir from our wilderness sanctuary that’s now just an embarrassing reminder of my otherness.
I swipe it away, only for it to fall right back. In the reflection of the medical equipment, I catch a glimpse of myself—wild-eyed and wind-chapped, looking like I’ve been dragged backward through the Alaskan wilderness. Which, technically, I have.
My jaw clenches so hard my teeth might crack as the perfect Lockhart family appraises me with their perfect eyes from their perfect heights.
Their synchronized microexpressions of distaste might as well be a choreographed dance number. Let them look. Let them see the mess who kept their precious Sebastian alive while they were planning photo ops and press releases.
I wait for Sebastian to say something. To tell her I didn’t crash the plane, that I saved his life, that I’m not just some “person.” That we... That we were... Something. Anything.
But he just stands there, mouth slightly open, caught between worlds. Between the man he was in the cabin and the son he is now.
The silence stretches, filling with all the things he isn’t saying.
His mother fills the void instead. “Well, at least you’re alive. Though I can’t imagine what possessed you to get on a cargo flight in the first place.” She touches his arm, her red-tipped fingers curling around his sleeve. “You should have waited for the family jet.”
I wait for him to correct her. To explain. To defend me. To say anything that acknowledges the past five days weren’t just a fever dream I invented.
He says nothing.
And in that nothing, I hear everything I need to know.
I shrink further, wishing I had my snow globe to fidget with. Or maybe to throw. Her perfume is making my head spin, too strong.
His father’s entrance makes Sebastian’s posture go even more rigid, if that’s possible.
“Son.” The word carries weight, authority, and generations of proper breeding. Everything about him screams old money, from his perfectly trimmed silver hair to his Italian leather shoes.
Sebastian’s mother fusses with his tie while his father clasps his shoulder with that precise pressure that speaks of country club handshakes and board room politics.
The choreography of reclamation, parents marking their territory, erasing the wilderness from their son, one designer touch at a time.
They move around Sebastian, straightening, adjusting, reclaiming. Not once do their eyes drift my way. I’ve vanished from the narrative. An inconvenient plot point best forgotten, a chapter to be edited out of the official family history.
I pick at a loose thread on the hospital blanket, counting the loops to keep from screaming. One heartbeat. Two. Three. The thread unravels a little more with each tug, just like my grip on reality.
He could say something now. Anything. “This is Bailey.” Three simple words that would acknowledge I exist beyond the function I served.
His mother’s manicured hands smooth invisible wrinkles from his shirt, her wedding ring catching the light. “Poor Rebecca’s been calling non-stop. She’s devastated.”
The thread comes loose in my fingers. I wrap it around my index finger until the tip turns purple, watching the color change like a personal science experiment in blood flow restriction. The numbness spreads from my finger to my chest. A welcome anesthetic.
Sebastian’s shoulders tighten. The muscle in his jaw twitches. But he doesn’t speak. Doesn’t turn.
The silence stretches like a rubber band about to snap. His mother’s perfume makes my eyes water.
“Rebecca’s on her way.” His mother says. “She caught the first flight when she heard. Should be here within the hour.”
My fingers go numb around the thread I’ve been fidgeting with. The world narrows to a pinpoint of perfect, awful clarity, like looking at an approaching disaster.
“Isn’t that wonderful, darling?” She beams at him, all perfect teeth and calculated warmth. “She was so worried. Poor thing barely slept.”
Rebecca. Here. Coming. My fingers twist the thread tighter, watching the purple deepen to blue, then an alarming shade of bloodless white.
The thread snaps. Blood rushes back into my fingertip, bringing pins and needles. Just like my heart. Just like my brain. Everything tingling, everything wrong.
Sebastian’s still frozen, that muscle in his jaw working overtime. I want to scream at him. Want to tell his mother about finding Rebecca in bed with someone else.
Want to throw something. Want to set this whole perfect tableau on fire and watch it burn. Instead, I count ceiling tiles and try to remember how to breathe. One. Two. Three. In. Out. Repeat until the urge to shatter glass subsides.
His mother’s eyes slide over me. Her perfect eyebrows lift a fraction. “What about…?”
“Miss Monroe was quite helpful,” Sebastian says. Like I was his Uber driver. His wilderness tour guide. His temporary inconvenience.
“Indeed.” His mother’s smile doesn’t reach her eyes, staying firmly anchored in the lower third of her Botox-smooth face. She pulls out a checkbook, the leather cover embossed with gold. “Thank you for helping my son. Now, about compensation—”
“No need.” My voice sounds foreign, like it’s coming from somewhere far away. “Just doing my job. Getting cargo from point A to point B.”
Sebastian flinches. The movement’s tiny, probably imperceptible to anyone who hasn’t spent days learning his every microexpression. But I see it. Good. At least he remembers enough to hurt.
A nurse appears, interrupting this exquisite torture. “Ms. Monroe? We need to take you for those X-rays now.”
I nod, grateful for the escape. The orderly wheels me away from Sebastian and his mother, their matching expressions of relief barely concealed as I leave their rarefied air.
The next few hours blur together—X-rays, blood tests, a trauma specialist. I answer questions on autopilot, my mind stuck in that curtained alcove where Sebastian sits with his mother, probably already being reclaimed by his real life.
When they finally wheel me back, the hospital’s shift change has come and gone. Late morning sun slants through the windows, casting long shadows across the floor. I brace myself to face Sebastian and his mother again, rehearsing neutral responses to avoid further humiliation.
But I’m not prepared for what I find.
Sebastian has undergone a transformation in my absence. His wilderness stubble is gone, hair neatly styled, wearing what must be the fresh clothes his team brought. Every trace of our cabin days methodically erased, replaced by the polished CEO I met at the airport—what feels like a lifetime ago.
Just as I adjust the thin hospital blanket over my legs, the distinctive click of heels echoes down the corridor.
Rebecca sweeps in like a Vogue cover come to life, all golden hair and perfect makeup, not a designer thread out of place. The room seems to brighten around her, as if even the lighting knows to make her look perfect.
“Sebastian!”
My stomach lurches as she throws herself into his arms, her perfume mixing with his mother’s in a toxic cloud of feminine territoriality.
She’s crying—perfect, delicate tears that don’t smudge her mascara.
The performance is flawless, down to the slight catch in her breath as she sobs. Oscar-worthy.
He doesn’t push her away.
His arms hang at his sides for a moment, but then they come up to steady her as she sobs into his chest. The same chest I slept on the night before last. The same arms that held me through wolf howls and nightmares.
Bile rises in my throat, bitter and burning. I swallow it down, tasting acid and regret.
Tell them, I silently beg him. Tell them what you found in that hotel room. Tell them about the other man. Tell them it’s an act. Stand up for something—for yourself, if not for me.
But he stands there, rigid and silent, while she performs her perfect girlfriend routine. His mother beams. His father nods. And I think I might actually throw up all over their Italian shoes.
The new thread I’ve been worrying snaps, leaving an ugly pull in the blanket. Just like the ugly truth unraveling in front of me. He won’t tell them. Won’t shatter their perfect picture. Won’t admit that their golden couple isn’t so golden after all.
Rebecca’s tears slow right on cue, and she pulls back just enough to gaze adoringly up at him. “I was so worried,” she whispers, her voice carrying just far enough for everyone to hear her devotion. “When I heard about the crash...”
The oxygen in the room thins with each calibrated sob. My lungs constrict, throat tightening like I’m breathing through a coffee straw. One more second in this room with these people and their performance, and I’ll shatter into something they’ll need to sweep under their imported Persian rugs.
“Well, this has been fascinating.” I grab the crutches propped against the bed, my movements jerky with suppressed emotion. “But I’ve reached my daily quota for family theater.”
The floor tilts as I try to stand. The crutches slip on the polished hospital floor.
Strong hands catch me, steadying me. Sebastian. His touch burns through my hoodie, hot enough to leave scars. For a heartbeat, we’re close enough that I catch his scent—no longer pine and snow, now cologne and antiseptic. Hospital Sebastian. Public Sebastian. Stranger Sebastian.
“Where are you going?” His eyes are stormy, saying things his perfect mouth won’t form into words. Begging for understanding he hasn’t earned, for forgiveness he hasn’t asked for.
“Out.” I adjust the crutches, putting distance between us. “Try not to need rescuing again, Mr. Lockhart.”
He flinches at the title like I’ve slapped him.
But what else can I call him? His arms are full of his sobbing girlfriend, his parents are already planning their PR strategy, and I’m standing here in clothes that smell like our cabin.
Like wood smoke and broken promises and things that were never meant to last.
Rebecca slides her manicured hand around Sebastian’s arm, her grip possessive as she guides him toward her.
His entourage falls into formation around them—the assistant with his pressed suit, the private doctor with his silver hair, the security personnel creating a barrier between them and the rest of the world. Between him and me.
Sebastian’s eyes find mine over Rebecca’s head, something unreadable flickering across his face.
For half a heartbeat, he looks like he might pull away, might say something. His mouth opens slightly, words forming and dying unspoken. But then Rebecca tugs his arm, and his mother’s hand settles on his back, steering him toward his people. His real people. His permanent people.
No one notices me hobbling past. I’m a shadow in a hoodie, invisible against their designer backdrop. The cargo pilot who doesn’t fit in their story.
My crutch catches on a floor tile, and I stumble, catching myself against the wall, palm slapping against the institutional paint.
The movement draws zero attention. They’re all focused on the Lockhart family reunion, Rebecca’s performance of devotion captivating her audience while Sebastian stands there, trapped in his own life like a snow globe figure unable to break free of the glass.
His mother’s voice carries down the corridor, “Darling, we need to address the engagement announcement. Rebecca’s been so understanding...”
I turn away, pushing through a side door into a quieter hallway. I need air that isn’t perfumed with expensive scents and falsehoods. I need space where I don’t have to watch him become someone I don’t recognize.
Some stories write themselves, and this one was always going to end with a perfect ring on a perfect finger in a perfect world that has no room for messy, loud, too-much Bailey Monroe.
I can’t help looking back. Just once. Like picking at a scab, knowing it’ll bleed but doing it anyway. A form of self-harm I can’t resist.
He looks...perfect. Hair styled now, suit pressed, every inch the CEO they expect him to be. But his jaw is tight. His smile doesn’t reach his eyes—those eyes that crinkled at the corners when I told him about naming my planes. Eyes that now look hollow, surrounded by people but completely alone.
I’m good at cargo. Cargo moves. Cargo flies. Cargo doesn’t watch news coverage of happy reunions or wonder if his hands are still warm or if he really meant it when he said I wasn’t too much.
Happy endings belong to people like Rebecca, who know how to fit inside perfect snow globe worlds. Not to people like me, who collect them from the outside, watching the snow fall around lives we’ll never have.