Chapter song: Can't Pretend - Tom Odell
The two men sat there in silence as Lucien's words rang in the room.
The previous haze that had been clouding his mind had cleared since Lucien spoke. When he looked at him, Kenneth felt a deep ache in his heart, almost as if he was sharing his pain.
It made him feel uncomfortable, not because he didn't want to share another person's emotions, but because he wished Lucien didn't have to feel it at all. And that shocked him. Suddenly, all he wanted to do was comfort him. To tell him everything was okay, even if it wasn't.
"…You made the choice," he started to say, making Lucien look at him. "Most people don't. You had to make a tough call even if you didn't want to." Because that was the thing about tough choices. You never knew whether your choice was right or wrong until you made it.
In Lucien's case, it was the wrong one. It was a reckless one. "But you learned from it, didn't you?"
