Jean texted: “That’s just the kind of person he is.”

+ Pearls

Dalton replied: “But I didn’t give up on him. Back then, I really thought he was pitiful… and I was afraid something bad might happen to him again. So I kept reaching out.”

Jean texted: “I really admire your persistence. If it were me, I wouldn’t have had that kind of patience.

Dalton responded: “Well, luckily, it ended up paying off. Your brother… eventually, he started acknowledging me a little. Then our relationship started to thaw, and things slowly improved. Sometimes we’d even go hiking together.”

Jean texted: “That couldn’t have been easy. Still can’t believe my brother actually wanted to be friends with you back then… that’s rare.”

Dalton replied: “It was rare. His personality at the time was already more or less the same as it is now. After the kidnapping, he changed a lot–he became cold, distant… like a wall you couldn’t get through. Maybe it was because I saved him once. Maybe he felt grateful. Honestly, I was really happy to be friends with him.”

Reading that, Jean couldn’t help but feel a little emotional.

Winston and Dalton… there had been a time when they understood each other–connected on some deep. unspoken level.

But now, all of that was gone. The two were like fire and ice, completely at odds.

on earth had happened

kept talking about the

He’d talk to me about what he was really feeling. For example, after I kept pressing him, he finally told me about the kidnapping… I didn’t know anything at first, and

“What did

park and being escorted home by Dalton–he realized something. Not a single person in the entire family had noticed he’d been missing for an entire day and night. Matheo hadn’t cared at all;

cold; no one had

and she’d actually treated him

first. She would follow his lead without question, completely

never liked

Winston had known that for a long time. But Sienna couldn’t see it—she was still being spun in

1/2

vay

379 What Even

day, after Winston got home, he saw Sienna inside his oldest

hadn’t been shut; it

Winston

the bed, his eyes

instinctively, a trace of

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