Bonita whispered, gently stroking Aria’s eyelids. It was a warm, gentle touch filled with love, just as she had said to the awakened Luke.

After finishing the meal, Bonita asked Mary to bring breakfast to Aria’s room. However, as Aria was deeply asleep, Bonita and Mary left the room after placing a simple breakfast next to the bed.

And now, Bonita was in the study, spreading out her notebook for studying characters.
After the private tutor, Hindley, visited once more, Bonita had progressed to learning up to the letter L in the alphabet.

‘What’s the difference between I and l?’

While studying the concepts of uppercase and lowercase letters, Bonita confirmed that she read two identical-looking letters, I and l, differently and annoyingly tapped her fingers. The mysterious symbols next to each alphabet that Hindley taught as pronunciation symbols only added to her headache.

‘Can’t I just not learn this?’

Bonita regretted her past assurance that she would try writing a letter by herself. Learning to write seemed not to suit her aptitude.

“Uh-uh.”

Moreover, her head had been strangely aching since she entered the study.

It was evident that she had overworked her brain by thinking too much. Bonita leaned her cheek on her hand while sipping the water next to her.

Instead of letters, dialogues between Luke and Catherine, shared at the dining room this morning, started floating in Bonita’s head.

“Did you handle yesterday’s talk well?”

“…No.”

“Tsk.”

It wasn’t a long conversation.

One could tell by the atmosphere alone. Luke kept glancing at the vacant seat where Aria should be, and when Bonita caught his eye, he looked at Aria.

Bonita didn’t question Luke about what he did to Aria yesterday. It was pointless to ask, as even if she heard, nothing would change.

‘But Dad…’

Despite Bonita’s disappointment in Luke, it didn’t mean she no longer loved her dad.

Clever Bonita knew how strangely Aria would react to Luke. In fact, although not her mother, it was true that the first Aria had hurt Bonita.

The problem was that other people couldn’t distinguish between mom and Aria. Bonita pondered on how to solve this issue.

“Ah.”

Her head hurt again. Breathing felt a bit difficult.

Bonita’s gaze turned to the teddy bear placed on the study shelf.

It was a gift from Oliver, and due to the playroom already being filled with Luke’s presents, it became a decoration on the study shelf, courtesy of Luke.

‘Should I stop?’

Bonita, who had been stretching her legs, jumped off the chair.

It was time to stop after sitting quietly for two hours.

The homework had been finished long ago, and writing it repeatedly until she memorized the characters thoroughly had caused weariness. Unfortunately, she still hadn’t deeply understood why uppercase and lowercase letters had the same pronunciation or why the similar-looking I and l were read differently. In fact, most of Bonita’s learning problems stemmed from trying to understand ‘why’ the characters looked the way they did. Trying to prove socially inexplicable conventions logically left her with no success.
However, there are always pros and cons to talent. Bonita’s thinking style hindered her from learning to read, but on the contrary, it was nothing short of a blessing when it came to exploring things that interested her.

“Miss, have you finished your homework?”

“Yeah. I’m going to play now.”

“Then, I’ll bring you some snacks!”

Mary, who spotted Bonita in the hallway, grinned and spoke.

Bonita’s mood brightened again at the thought of eating snacks. She still worried about Aria, but since she was resting in the room, it should be okay.

Moreover, there were toys she couldn’t wait to play with since yesterday. Bonita hurriedly went to the playroom and assembled the pile of toy train tracks.

“Miss, today it’s cookies.”

At that moment, Mary, smiling, placed a cookie next to Bonita.

“Shall I help you with the assembly?”

“No, I’ll do it myself.”

Bonita said so and carefully examined the illustrations in the instructions and the pieces of the train track she had assembled so far with a very serious expression.

Mary put a cookie into Bonita’s mouth as she worked. Like a baby bird receiving a snack, Bonita, who was about to chew, hesitated for a moment.

With a puzzled expression, Mary asked, “Miss, why are you like that?”