#Chapter 37 – What Happened To Me?
#Chapter 37 – What Happened To Me?
Stella
I smile and wave goodbye to my family as they exit the restaurant. My parents get into their car and drive away just as Luca pulls up in his modified sports car. Silas gets inside the passenger seat, with Dominic shoving himself into the tiny backseat, and they wave before Luca’s car lunges away.
I can’t help but laugh, rolling my eyes and turning around. Sebastian stands behind me. My eyes flicker down to his wrist where he wears the new watch I got for him.
“Do you like it?” I ask and step towards him. Sebastian nods, a coy smile on his face, as he raises his hand into the air, showing it off.
“I love it, thank you for this, Stella,” he says.
I nod in return and watch as Amber wheels out my wagon. Sebastian is quick to take it from her and she waves us away as we wait beside the valet.
“The person who worked there said it is a one of a kind watch,” I gently take Sebastian’s hand and hold out his watch in front of our faces. I point to the always moving hand that ticks away the seconds. “They said that its parts were recovered from a shipwreck sixty years ago.”
“Oh really?” Sebastian asks. I can feel his eyes on the side of my face. I nod and drop his hand, folding them behind my back. “That is one of a kind, then.”
“I like to think of it as a rebirth,” I add, finally turning my face to look up at him. “A new beginning for all of out lives. One that I finally get to live with my true family.”
A flash of hurt and sorrow streaks across Sebastian’s face but he covers it up before I can make a comment on it. His car pulls up and the restaurant’s car valet stops out. He takes the key from the employee and turns to me.
“Can I give you and your wagon a ride home?” Sebastian’s tone is amused when he mentions the wagon. I nod and roll my eyes, following him to his car.
He pops open the trunk and stuffs the folded wagon inside, quickly coming back to me and opening up the passenger side door as I leave a hefty tip for the valet attendant. I get inside and thank him, watching as he gets into the drivers seat, quickly driving me home.
Sebastian has me in front of my apartment building sooner than I anticipated. We get out and a gust of chilly wind makes me shiver. Sebastian places his jacket over my shoulders, guiding me inside.
The walk to my door is quiet. We look everywhere but each other’s eyes and I can’t help but feel a bit awkward, my mind wandering to other subjects. As soon as my door comes into our sight, I pull out my key and unlock it, turning to Sebastian.
“Thanks for the ride,” I shrug his jacket off and pass it back to him, “I appreciate it.”
“Thank you for the gift,” he smiles.
Suddenly, he pulls me into a hug. My breath gets caught in my throat. I hug him back and slowly pull away after a few moments, my heart fluttering inside my chest.
“Have a goodnight, Sebastian,” his warmth lingers on my body.
“You too,” he responds. He stays behind for a brief moment before turning around and walking down the hallway.
I quickly enter my apartment and lock the door behind me.
Is that how I am supposed to be treated? With dignity and love?
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#Chapter 37 What Happened To Me?
My entire body feels lighter than usual. After spending time with my family, I feel better about the circumstances that I’m living in. My family has made me feel so welcome, so seen, and I know that I will never be left behind when they’re around.
Their kind actions and words are a stark contrast to what I have dealt with through Clara and her parents. My biological family lifts me up whereas my foster one only brings me down.
To them, I am simply a bag of spare parts that they can pick apart and freely choose from. To them, I am nothing more than an inconvenience until they decide that I am worthy enough for their love.
It doesn’t help that Adrian, a man who was supposed to fulfill the role as my husband, always takes their side instead of listening to me and to reason.
Adrian is always quick to defend Clara and her bratty actions. He is so enamored by her that he is unable to see reason. It makes my heart ache at the thought that he has no idea that she is going to run right through him.
Sebastian and my brothers didn’t even have to think before they came to my defense with my father. They supported me through their claps and words of affirmation. They have done more for me in the past month than Adrian has throughout our five years of marriage.
I move throughout my apartment and shed myself of the clothes from the dinner and slip into something more comfortable. I swipe my laptop from my desk and stare at the darkened screen.
I wonder what my life would have looked like if I never disappeared from my family, if I was never taken. Would I be in top health? Would my life have been so much easier without Adrian in it?
Remembering the name of the orphanage that I was picked up from, I sneak into their website, hacking my way inside their mainframe with complete ease. It looks like their security hasn’t been updated in awhile.
I poke my nose around their files, scrolling through the past two decades before landing on my birth year. My lips purse and I shift my way through the waves of information, digging deeper and deeper until I land on a security file.
Inside sits hours upon hours of security footage. I quickly navigate my way through the dates, moving closer and closer to the month and day that was on my entrance form.
The footage itself isn’t the greatest. It is grainy and it sometimes cuts out when the power goes out during thunderstorms. I guess the night I was dropped off was during one of those storms since the feed keeps going to black before turning back on.
A woman walks up the steps. She holds something in her arms. It is a baby swaddled in a red blanket, contrasting against her black coat.
I suck in a breath, leaning closer towards the laptop’s screen as if I can get a better look by getting closer to it.
The woman looks around before placing the baby in front of the orphanage’s doors. She slams her fists on the door and rushes away, disappearing out of the video’s frame. I pause the video and sit in silence.
Is this baby me? The baby in the video matches the description on my entrance form. The red blanket, the stormy night, the timing…it all adds up.
I rewind the video, hanging onto the hope that I can get a clear look of her face. I screenshot the video and immediately open the file, my heart pounding inside my chest, and expend the picture.
It is a still image of her face but I can’t seem to get the film grain to go away. I groan and move to the hacke mainframe, posting an anonymous job posting asking for help alongside a decent amount of money or favors in
return.
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#Chapter 37 – What Happened) 18 Me?
I close my laptop and push it to the side. I fall back into bed and stare at the ceiling.
Questions run through my mind. So many of them are left unanswered. I sigh and look to the side of me, staring at the empty place in bed next to me. I reach out and place my hand over the empty area, wishing that he was here
with me.
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