This Is Not The Kind of Nightlife I Meant

Sebastian Maddox – POV

Four months later — Bangkok, Thailand

She didn't even knock. She just barged into my room in our hotel suite, sunglasses on, bare-faced, grinning like she'd just bought a country.

"Get up," she said, yanking the sheets off me. "You're too hot to be in bed past noon in a foreign country. We have markets to destroy, food to abuse, and memories to emotionally repress together."

I groaned, arm slung over my face. "Sky. Please. I'm begging you. Let me sleep. It's our third day here."

"Exactly. You haven't even bartered with a single screaming Thai auntie. You haven't eaten a single bug. You haven't been scammed. You're not doing this right."

"Why are you like this?"

"Because if I let you stay in bed all day you'll start thinking about life again and get all broody and annoying and—guess what? We already had that arc, baby. Now get up. You're in your healing era."

I sat up with a growl. She handed me a coffee—too sweet, the way I like it—and kissed my temple like nothing in the world had ever gone wrong between us.

Maybe it hadn't.

Or maybe she'd decided she was stronger than the pain. Stronger than the past. Stronger than Rain.

And if she could do that? Then I could too.

The streets of Bangkok were loud, chaotic, and weirdly beautiful. And Sky? She was in her element. She held my hand through crowds like I was five again, made me take ugly selfies with every fried noodle stall, and aggressively fake-laughed at every dad joke I made.

We rode tuk-tuks. Bargained like con artists. She made me try coconut ice cream, mango sticky rice, and something called "fried silkworms" I refused on moral grounds.

It was one of the best days of my life.

I forgot about Rain.

I forgot about shame.

I forgot that there were months where I couldn't meet her eyes because I'd become the very thing that broke her once.

She was...alive here.

And somehow, I was too.

Night fell.

She pulled me into a rooftop club with a glowing sign that screamed SIN AND SPICE. Of course she'd pick that one.

"I've seen your nightlife," she said into my ear over the music. "Now it's your turn to see mine."

"What does that mean?"

She didn't answer. She just led me in, ordered me a fancy mocktail with a sparkler in it, and started dancing like she hadn't cried on my chest four months ago and said I'm sorry I'm a bad mom.

But I remembered.

I always would.

She spun around, grabbed my face with both hands, and said, "You're safe. Here. With me."

And I believed her.

We came back to the suite past midnight. My feet were killing me. She flopped on the couch and pulled out something wrapped in a banana leaf.

"Time for your final challenge, young Maddox."

I narrowed my eyes. "Sky. What is that."

"Durian."

"What the hell is that."

"The king of fruits."

"You say that like it's not about to kill me."

"Sebastian." She looked me dead in the eye. "Eat it."

One bite.

That's all it took.

I gagged.

And before I could stop myself—I was mid-hack, dry-heaving—she shoved her hand under my chin.

"Spit it here."

"WHAT."

"Spit. In my hand. Like when you were a baby."

"YOU ARE UNWELL."

"Spit, Sebastian!"

I did. I don't know why. I just...did.

She caught it. Wiped it off. Threw the tissue away. Then gagged herself. "Oh god. That was disgusting. I love you but you're disgusting."

I was crying laughing at this point.

She stared at me for a second.

Then she said, softer than she ever had before, "Thank you for still letting me be your mom. Even after everything."

I blinked.

And she just smiled like that didn't break me clean open.

I couldn't say it out loud.

But I'd let her be my mom every day.

Even if the world burned down.

Even if I got lost again.

Even if we never forgot the shit we'd been through.

She was Sky Maddox.

And I'd follow her to the ends of the earth. Or at least to the next food stall.

"Okay," she said, wiping her hand again and cracking her neck. "Tomorrow we try scorpions."

"Sky—"

"Don't make me hold my hand out again, you little shit."

And somehow—just like that—I felt whole again.

----

Four countries in four months.

Japan. Thailand. Korea. And now China.

And somehow, this chaotic woman still had surprises left.

We were supposed to be healing. "Bonding," she called it. A mother-son world tour.

But healing with Sky Maddox wasn't sitting in cafes and talking about feelings.

Healing meant duck tongues, demon spice levels, impromptu karaoke at midnight in a neon-lit alley, and the one unforgettable night in Seoul where she made me race a local biker gang and then threw up cotton candy on my hoodie.

It started in Tokyo.

She dragged me through every district like she owned the place.

In Harajuku, she forced me into a full pink outfit and took selfies with me until my soul left my body.

In Shibuya, she got us lost on purpose "so we'd make core memories."

In Kyoto, she sat me down under a sakura tree and said, "You're not broken, Sebby. You're just blooming late. Like these."

It should've been cringy. It made me cry instead.

Thailand was worse.

She made me eat this thing—some devil-chili mango noodle nightmare—and when I nearly died on the street, she said, "It's called flavour, darling."

We danced barefoot on a beach during a festival. She made me laugh so hard I forgot I ever knew pain. Then she cried while watching lanterns float into the sky and said, "This is what I dreamed of. Not just being your mom—but getting to be with you."

I didn't say anything. But I hugged her that night without needing to be told to.

Then came Korea.

Oh, Seoul.

She made me dress up for a K-pop club night, told everyone I was famous, and when I panicked, she winked and said, "You are. You're mine."

I think I smiled for two days straight.

Now it was China.

And somehow, after all that chaos and healing, we'd just stumbled into a strip club.

By accident. (Allegedly.)

Sky yanked me out like I was five and she was my scandalized Victorian governess.

"You weren't supposed to see that," she huffed, pacing outside like the world had ended.

"I didn't! You tackled me before I could blink!"

"I just took my son to a strip club. A STRIP CLUB."

"We've literally been to worse places, Sky."

"But it was sleazy."

"So were half your exes."

She smacked my shoulder. I laughed. She didn't.

We moved on—ended up in a chaotic night market, and that's when she gave me the skewer.

Duck tongue.

I tried it.

I gagged.

I panicked.

And then she did the most Sky Maddox thing in the world.

She held out her hand.

"Spit it."

"Are you INSANE?"

"I birthed you. You've done worse to me."

"THAT IS NOT THE SAME THING—"

"Spit it, Sebastian."

I gave up and spat it straight into her palm.

She didn't even flinch. Flicked it in a bin. Cleaned her hand.

"Mother of the Year," she said.

"Please let me die in peace."

But I didn't really want to die.

Because in that stupid, chaotic, hilarious, loving moment—surrounded by streetlights and crowds and bad food—I realized something.

She wasn't fixing me.

She was freeing me.

One country at a time.

One nightmare meal at a time.

She wasn't just dragging me around the world to escape what I'd done.

She was showing me the parts of me I forgot existed.

The boy who laughed.

The boy who lived.

The boy who knew he was loved.

God help me, I even loved duck tongue.

(Okay no. Not that far.)

The end .

Signing off.

Siddhii Singh