Everlastingly Loving You - Chapter 143

“What are you doing in my quarters?” Louis demanded.

“Get the hell out of here!” He yelled.

Marcus sighed.

He shook his head, “Louis, no.”

Louis scoffed, “What did you just say?”

Marcus placed a tray down on Louis’ empty desk.

“I know you lost one of the only familial figures you ever had in your life,” Marcus began.

“And I also know you needed space.”

“But I have given you space.”

“I’ve given you a whole week.”

“And you didn’t bother to take care of yourself while you were too occupied grieving and mourning the loss of your grandmother, I’m not blaming you,” Marcus assured.

“But someone has to be there for you.”

“And even if you hate me.”

“Even if you scream or yell at me to go away, I’m not going away.”

“When I was stuck in a hospital bed, you asked me to be your boyfriend.”

“Not some other guy, but me.”

“And I made a promise to you when I became your boyfriend. That I’d stick by you no matter what you’re going through and I intend to stick to that promise.”

“Even if you hate me for doing this and forcing you to do things like eat or take a shower, I don’t care.”

“All I care about is making sure you’re okay, because whether you like it or not I’m still your boyfriend, and because I’m that, I have to do some things you may not want me to do,” Marcus said firmly.

“You’re starving, you haven’t eaten proper food in a week.”

“Do you know the toll it’s taken on you?” Marcus reasoned, looking over at Louis’ sickly condition.

“Julia wouldn’t want this.”

“How would you know what’d she want?” Louis glared at him.

“I have your best interests at heart, Louis.”

“I wouldn’t do something unless it was meant to benefit you.”

“So just putting all of this aside, would you just eat some damn food?”

“For me,” Marcus asked hopefully.

Louis looked back and forth between Marcus and the tray that’d been set on his desk.

His face was stained with dirt, and he looked unrecognizable in his current state.

His old self seemed to return for a moment.

“Okay,” he nodded.

Marcus smiled gratefully before he walked over to him.

“Go take a shower,” he ordered.

“We’re attending her funeral.”

“It’s better than you being holed up in here.”

“I don’t want to attend her funeral,” Louis crossed his arms.

“Are you sure it’s you talking, or the denial talking?”

Louis hesitated.

“See,” Marcus reasoned.

“Fine,” Louis huffed in annoyance.

__

Before everyone else arrived, Julia’s closest family and friends gathered at the funeral venue, where they were supposed to meet. But, it was to be noted not everyone had arrived yet at the old medieval stone church the ceremony was being held in.

“Where’s Louis?” Sophia looked around her surroundings to see loads of red and pink carnations and gladiolis.

The red carnations represented the admiration held for her, while the pink stood for remembrance; the gladiolis represented Julia’s strength of character and sincerity.

Nicholas assured, “He’s probably running late to the ceremony or something.”

It’d been weeks since he’d left the palace – things were going all too fast while he was still crawling his way through, trying to adapt while everything around him changed.

“Don’t worry about it too much,” he said to her, knowing Sophia was looking for something to shift her focus on. Something other than the funeral itself.

It was a great distraction but she knew it wouldn’t give her the closure she came here for.

“He’s not coming to the funeral is he?” Sophia asked aloud.

Nicholas told her not to fret about it too much.

Whether or not Louis would come or not wasn’t up to her.

“Let’s get seated,” Nicholas suggested.

Sophia nodded, finding a seat at the front row, where Julia would’ve wanted her.

Family was placed at the front row, close friends at the second, and at the third were other foreign dignitaries, and at the backrow were friends of family members, etc.

Clarisse was seated at the backrow, Blaine and Oliver sitting beside her.

There was this strange aura of awkward tension surrounding the three of them, and all of them felt it. It wasn’t simply Clarisse who felt something was up.

She caught Blaine glaring at Oliver, she nudged him in the shoulder.

“This is a funeral, not a glare-fest,” she chided.

“Be respectful, we’re only guests here, same goes for Oliver,” Clarisse added.

Blaine glared at Oliver one last time before he took a deep breath and nodded.

“You’re right.”

Something wasn’t right, and he knew it.

Not to mention, Oliver could’ve sat anywhere but he chose to sit next to his girlfriend.

He understood they were friends, but seriously?

Oliver could’ve placed some distance between him and Clarisse.

Well, Blaine supposed he was being quite unfair, Oliver and Clarisse had a great deal of distance between them, but not necessarily enough.

Relatives of Julia were offered the chance to present a speech during the funeral, but no one had stepped up to the plate.

Perhaps it was because Julia’s death had been so unexpected.

Perhaps it was because everyone had nothing to say.

Or perhaps it was something else.

(Author’s Note: A eulogist is who delivers a speech in a funeral and in most cases, is someone who knew the deceased person well.)

Sophia and Nicholas heard a familiar voice from the dais.

They heard someone clear his throat.

“Being asked to deliver this speech was the most daunting task I’d ever been asked to do. I’ve never done a eulogy before, but here goes.”

“My grandmother wasn’t a simple woman, I’m certain you all know that,” Louis began, hearing a couple people chuckling.

“She was never a simple woman to please, but that was what I personally loved most about her. She gave me a sense of who I was and where I came from while at the same time making sure I remained humble and modest. Without her, I wouldn’t be standing front and center, and I would’ve ended up spoiled and bratty. Hell, I wouldn’t have bothered coming here.”

He hesitated – everything was coming naturally, he hadn’t planned anything to say in advance.

Louis spotted his sister in the front row, he hadn’t been focusing on the audience, rather, himself.

She couldn’t meet his gaze.

Louis looked back up, “Why we’re gathered here today mourning her loss, I’d like to assure was no one’s fault.”

“Fate had this planned for her, and it was better this than her suffering through horrendous pain.”

Sophia stared at him, knowing this’d been directed towards her.

‘It’s not your fault,’ was what Louis was trying to tell her.

Staring at her lap, Sophia found comfort knowing Julia hadn’t suffered too long.

She exhaled, knowing things could’ve ended in a million more horrific ways.

Louis continued on, “I know that Julia wouldn’t want any of us to grieve or mourn her loss for extended periods of time. She’d call it unnecessary and ask us to move on with whatever we have going on in our lives.”

He inhaled, “What I also know is that she loved everyone in this very room.”

“As well as her people,” Louis added, referencing the people of Beldovia.

Outside the church, someone stepped out of the car.

He slammed the door shut.

Louis chuckled, “I remember her telling me I had to chin up and pick myself up after whatever I faced when I was a young child.”

Sophia held Nicholas’ hand.

“We’re going to get through this,” she whispered over to him as Louis continued on and on with his eulogy.

She knew her brother – and what he’d say.

He had a closer relationship with Julia then she ever had, he was meant to deliver the speech, not her or anyone else for that matter.

“We will,” Nicholas nodded.

Sophia rested her head on his.

He kissed her on the forehead – their first ever public display of affection – if you deemed the setting public.

Sophia didn’t seem to mind, she was staring down at her lap, spacing out.

The man that was outside the church straightened his suit before he walked a couple steps over to the church doors.

After taking one deep breath,  he regained his composure and opened the doors. So he really was doing this.

A loud creak echoed off the church’s walls.

Everyone turned around to see what’d caused the commotion, but that seemingly didn’t frighten him.

Sophia turned her head around to take a look of who’d arrived and gasped. Louis stopped mid-speech.

He cleared his throat, replacing his nervous look with his signature smile, “Sorry I was late, let’s continue, shall we?”

Something in Sophia clicked.

Raymond wasn’t the name of her grandfather.

It wasn’t a friend of hers grandmere had made throughout her rule of Beldovia.

It, was the name…

…of her son.

Sophia trembled as she stared at the man she thought was dead all this time across the church hall.

“D-dad?” She stuttered.