The day she disappeared from the mansion was a day filled with nightmares, one he had to forget the moment he woke up.

Eugene irritably brushed his hair back.

‘I should never have set out like this in the first place.’

The person who should have been in his embrace before even reaching out. The person who was always there.

As if she would always return to him, her final destination.

The annoyance gradually tilted towards urgency. When the thought struck him that he might never find her, it even scared him.

‘How did I end up in this state… Ah.’

The half-smoked cigar was buried in the sand. He stubbed out the lingering ember with his foot and turned away.

As if turning his back on the black sea would erase the illusions of Helena.

Not thinking about Helena any longer was the only thing he could do for now.

Among the clattering footsteps, Helena quietly started the conversation.

“You said you came to find me because you owed me.”

“……Yes, that’s right.”

Ian looked down at her and responded. Helena briefly met his gaze, then turned her head back to the front.

“But don’t dwell too much on past matters. I was such a fool when I was young, even giving away my bread to stray cats while starving myself.”

“I somehow thought you would have done that.”

Not the reaction she had hoped for, Helena grew a bit anxious. The black clouds drew closer, echoing her state of mind.

Under the darkening sky, Helena continued the conversation.
“You say you want to repay a favor, but honestly, it probably wasn’t anything significant. At most, what significant thing could a teenager have done?”

“…….”

“So, what I mean is, there’s no need to keep doing this.”

“What have I done?”

At that moment, Helena’s steps halted abruptly.

His nonchalant tone had caused it. Helena couldn’t believe his innocent-looking face.

Was he really unaware, or just pretending to be?

“What have you done? Everything you’ve done until now. All these actions, whether they are surveillance, protection, or observation.”

Her nervousness deepened, quickening her speech.

“Enough with the favor. I’ve already received more than enough. There’s no need for you to stay by my side, especially when the situation seems unfavorable.”

“It’s because I’m still lacking. Once I’m sufficient, I’ll leave.”

Why, why?

“You say that because you don’t know. You don’t know what it’s like to be in a situation where everything’s tangled, gone wrong, with no way to untangle it, surrounded by enemies, not knowing where it begins or ends. You don’t know what it feels like to be trapped in perfect misery.”

“Do you think you know me?”

“I don’t want to know.”

“Why, because a woman as tattered as me isn’t worthy of understanding?”

Is he not giving me the answers I want?

“Because you don’t need to bear me!”

“And you don’t have the right or need to decide that.”

Why isn’t he saying what I need to hear?

Why does he have to disrupt everything?

Helena released her pent-up heat through trembling lips.

“Don’t try to understand. You and I can never be the same. If it was just a passing feeling, I wouldn’t be in this mess. But what if that feeling becomes your life?”

“Don’t just make assumptions.”

“Right now, or rather, I just feel like unhappiness itself. It’s not that unlucky things happen to me; it’s that I was just born unlucky. So—”

“You don’t want me to get closer if you don’t want to add to my misery?”

“……!”

“I decide my own misery. Leaving you now would be my misery.”

No, no.

Helena exhaled a fluttering breath. She seemed to be the only one swept away by emotions.

Despite causing all this turmoil, he was calm like the eye of a storm. Dangerously calm.

Helena spread her arms and pointed at him in protest.

“Look at you now. You didn’t come to find me just to be my porter.”

“So, if I do something other than being a porter, can I stay by your side?”

“Are you joking?”

“Does it sound like a joke?”

Helena had to revise her opinion of him once more.

He really had no words he couldn’t say, and with those words alone, he defeated her. She resented her past self for getting entangled with such a man.

‘Why did I get involved with him?’

A dry sigh of lost resolution escaped her. A change in approach was needed.

Helena brushed her hair away, revealing a scar about the size of a little finger on her forehead.

“Can you see it? I can’t remember much before I got hurt as a child. Plus, it’s been like 20 years-”

She abruptly changed her sentence.

“-It’s as if 20 years have passed, so I don’t remember you at all.”
“I can’t predict how I will feel in the future. I just wish you would give up on me before it’s too late.”

As it has always been, I too want to forget him as if he were just a dream.

However, he seems to be intent on etching his presence into me at every moment.

“It doesn’t matter.”

He willingly chose to become a reality.