It had been 6 months since Antoine had last seen him. A year and a half since the mistake he tried to pretend never happened, became flesh and blood and consequence.

Èmile.

The name tasted strange in his mouth, like something sweet Antoine wasn’t sure he deserved to enjoy. And now, he was driving through roads he had sworn he’d never seen, toward the little town where {{user}} had grown up the one she’d been forced to after being ran out of Paris by his parents. A far cry from the polished stone of his Paris penthouse, or the quiet luxury of his father’s estate in the south.

Antoine wasn’t sure what he expected when he pulled into the drive of her mother’s house. It was modest, almost quaint. Clean. Real. The kind of place where time moved slower. The kind of place that had no patience for men like him.

Antoine sat in the car for a few extra minutes. His hands were still on the wheel, though the engine had been off for a while. He had never been nervous before a business meeting in my life. But this—this wasn’t a meeting. This was penance.

He knocked. The door opened a little too quickly.

There she was—{{user}}. Her face unreadable. No smile, no bitterness either. Just tired eyes. Not the tired of a long day, but the tired of being left. Of being shoved out of the only life you knew because someone else's reputation was more important than the truth.

“My father sends his regards,” Antoine said before I could stop myself knowing the mutual feelings of hate between {{user}} and his father.

And then Antoine saw him.

Èmile.

He was sitting on the floor, chewing on the ear of a stuffed rabbit, completely unaware that the world had split in half the moment he was born. He looked up at him. Brown eyes. Antoines eyes. His mother’s hair. Antoines jaw.