Aeli lowered her head and looked down.

Her round forehead, with hair falling halfway back, caught the eye.

So, the sight of legs and head floating in the air without touching anything.

-…….

More precisely, the child was also startled and clung to Aeli’s arm like a cicada without realizing it.

“……Huh?”

Blinking his big eyes a couple of times, the child finally realized what he was holding onto and opened his mouth slightly.

Likewise, Aeli, confirming the child clinging to her arm, opened her mouth wide without being able to say anything.

Her arm… that is, her body itself was still in a semi-transparent state, but.

‘Now, is it really touching me now?’

In this incomprehensible situation, both were frozen, just blinking their eyes.

Then, when Mari, feeling puzzled, stretched her neck to stare at them, they both came to their senses similarly.

“Young master? What’s wrong?”

“Ah, uh?”

“……Are you hurt somewhere?”

Perhaps worried about the dazed child.

To Mari’s concerned voice, the child quickly shook his head.

However, from Mari’s current position, there was no way she could properly see the child.

He only realized a beat late that no matter how passionately he shook his head, it was of no use.

The upside-down child stopped shaking his head and hurriedly opened his mouth.

“No, no! I’m not hurt!”

Reflexively bending her waist to lower her arm, the child placed both hands on the floor and rolled half a turn.

While letting go of Aeli’s arm he had been holding onto, as Mari had somehow come around to the opposite side of the bed, the child looked quite regretful.

Mari, who had been closely observing the child sitting on the floor with his legs stretched out and his hair all disheveled, said.

“Are you really not hurt anywhere? You didn’t sprain your wrist, did you?”

“Mm… I’m fine because someone caught me.”

“Pardon? Someone caught you?”

What? Mari asked with a puzzled face, but the question didn’t reach the child who was already alternately looking at his own hand and Aeli’s arm with a lingering expression.

Seeming to think that further questioning wouldn’t yield a clear answer, Mari picked up the child in her arms, sat him back on the bed, and then spoke.

“Young master.”

“……”

“Young master?”

“Mm.”

“I’m sorry for insisting you eat the beans you dislike. But you were very sick yesterday and today, weren’t you?”

“Mm……”

“I really just want you to be healthy. Actually, I used to think that picky eating could be substituted with other foods, but……”

Mari, who had been talking while making eye contact with the child, suddenly trailed off.

“……Anyway, from now on, you shouldn’t run away like that no matter how much you dislike it. Especially running around dangerously fast inside the room.”

“……”

“Will you promise me?”

“I’m sorry……”

“I’m sorry too.”

Mari lightly hugged the child who was apologizing with his head bowed low and mumbling.

However, that expression, which wouldn’t have been visible to the child as they were hugging, looked more complicated than Aeli had thought.

[……! Mari……!] [You must keep it a secret that I ate it instead. If my mother finds out again, I’ll really die this time……] [Of course, thank you!]

What if both of you become unwell because of that?

It felt like hearing the unspoken words.

[This is the timeline separator]

Despite all that zealous running away, as soon as the hug ended, the child had to empty the plate full of bean soup.

It was because of Mari’s firm attitude that reconciliation was reconciliation and meals were a separate matter.

Perhaps he couldn’t stage another escape after having such a conversation just now.

Although he made a face, the child finished his meal, and Mari clapped her hands saying how wonderful it was that he ate well, then left the room to clean up. She had placed a candy in the child’s hand before leaving.

-…….

“……”

As if on cue, Aeli and the child, whose eyes met, watched each other’s reactions.

When it seemed like an immeasurable amount of time had passed and the child’s patience had reached its limit, he slowly approached.

Tok.

“……!”

The small hand hesitated, then slowly reached out, and finally poked Aeli’s semi-transparent arm.

Although she couldn’t feel the soft skin characteristic of a young child, or the warm body temperature.

-……Child, can you touch mommy?

“Uh, uh, yes……”

Aeli slowly blinked her eyes, confirming once again that the tiny index finger didn’t pass through her arm but was blocked.

How many moments had there been when she could only watch by the child’s side, unable to touch due to being a ghost?

Even using all fingers and toes, it was impossible to count them all.

-…….

It seemed like she had counted quite a few things she wanted to do if she could touch the child while imagining.

But when her wish was unexpectedly granted, her mind went blank.

She just stared blankly at the black crown of the head in front of her, not knowing what to do.

Tok.

Tok tok.

……Tok tok tok.

Aeli quickly came to her senses as the child rolled his eyes to check her reaction, poked her arm once, then rolled his eyes again and poked her arm once more.

The child also seemed to react as if he couldn’t believe it.

‘……Suddenly able to touch?’

Aeli racked her brain to think.

It would be nice if it really was just a sudden ability to touch.

But if that were the case, conversely, she might become unable to touch again at any moment.

So if there was another reason, she needed to find it.

-……Adi.

Tok tok

“……”

-Adi?

……Tok.

-…….

“……Ah, oh! Yes, yes.”

The child, who had been distracted as if he had seen an apparition, belatedly responded.

Aeli hesitated for a moment with her hand raised, then placed it on the child’s head, stroking it as she opened her mouth.

-Is there anything that comes to mind?

“Come, to mind?”

-Mmm. ……Ah. Do you know how Adi can touch mommy?

“……”

The child sneakily looked around, then bowed his head low.

He seemed to be playing with his fingers, holding his hands together, then slowly shook his head. It meant he didn’t know either.

Aeli, who hadn’t had high expectations despite asking, just nodded as if to say, I see.

‘Then first…..’

We should check if other things can be touched too. Aeli rolled her eyes to look around the room and reached out towards the nearby bed headboard.

Swoosh.

“Uh, uh……”

Aeli quietly withdrew her hand as she saw the child’s eyes trembling wildly at the grotesque sight of her arm piercing through the bed headboard.

She felt a sense of déjà vu.

‘Seems like the bed doesn’t work.’

Next, she tried touching the nightstand, couch, swing, and everything else within reach, but failed similarly.

Finally, after passing through the door and walls, going in and out, Aeli awkwardly opened her mouth.

-Umm…… It seems I can only touch Adi?

It was exactly as she said. Aeli became deep in thought at the situation where only touching the child was possible, with nothing else changed.

Just as she was narrowing her eyes in contemplation, wondering what it could be.

“Ung……”

-Ah, ……did Adi call me?

Aeli, who hadn’t been watching the child for a moment while lost in thought, startled and bent her upper body.

The child, who had been checking her reaction, opened his mouth slightly.

“Izzat, um……”

-Yes, baby.

“Um, umma……”

Even just calling out the title, his cheeks quickly turned red again.

The child wiped his sweaty palms on his clothes and asked.

“If it’s really…… that only I can touch you……”

-Yes.

“……Can I do just, one thing?”

It’s a wish….. The child trailed off at the end of his sentence.

Aeli tilted her head to the side and nodded affirmatively. After a few seconds passed like that.

“……”

-Adi, is it difficult to say?

Aeli spoke to the child who couldn’t easily open his mouth despite nodding.

“That…… it’s……”

-It’s okay. If it’s difficult, mommy will say it’s difficult, so why don’t you write it on my palm first?

“Ung……”

And so, the “wish” she heard was…….

A hug.

Those were the letters the small hand raised and carefully wrote down at Aeli’s words.

-…….

That was the “wish.”

At that moment, Aeli was speechless and unconsciously stretched out her arms.

When she hugged the child to her chest, she felt something moving slightly around her chest, and then felt hands embracing her back.

“……Sniff.”

How long had it been? Aeli thought as she heard the soft sniffling sound in her ear.

For her, it was just over a month, but for the child, it was a past he couldn’t even remember.

‘……4 years.’

At the unfathomable number, Aeli closed her eyes and took a deep breath to compose herself.

She thought he had grown unrecognizably, but the child she held in her arms again was much smaller than she had estimated by eye.

Yes. ……He was very small.

-……Adi.

“Yes……”

While it seemed somewhat fortunate, it was also inexplicably sorrowful.

Aeli picked up the child who was trying to slip out of her arms with a gloomy face and sat him on her lap. It would be a scene to make someone faint if they saw it, but she didn’t care.

It was just the two of them anyway.

-Is there nothing else you want to do?

“More……?”

-Yes. Wasn’t there anything else you wanted to do with mommy?

If hugging is the end, mommy might be a little sad. At the words spoken with a deliberately sad face, the child jumped up and shook his head.

It was with the words that there actually was more.

So, in the middle of the night, guided by the child, they sneaked back to the inner part of the attic.

There, the child carefully pulled out several sheets of paper that had been tucked between books. It was the very paper that the child had once diligently scribbled on with pen and ink by himself, but never showed to anyone.

“He, here……”

The child hesitated for a long time, fiddling with it in his hands, before handing it to Aeli.

.

.

.

-This is…….

Aeli, who kept repeating the same words after a small gasp, heard the child speak.

“There were many things I wanted to do when I got a mommy and daddy.”

-…….

“But…… since I couldn’t do them right away, I wrote them down instead of forgetting,”

The child smiled, saying he had already fulfilled one.

He said there were many things he wanted to do when he got a mom and dad.

……It wasn’t that they would ‘appear’, but that they had ‘always been there’.

Seeing the face smiling so happily without knowing her feelings, it somehow made her feel queasy.

Aeli deliberately clenched her fist to pull up the corners of her mouth into a smile and spoke.

-Then, then…… shall we start with what we can do now?

“Really…… is it okay?”

-Yes.

“……Will you do it?”

-……Of course.

That night.

Aeli held the child in her arms all night long, gradually erasing the things written on the paper. Most of them were really nothing special.

Wishes that others might consider ordinary daily life.

Until the sun faintly showed its face through the attic window. Aeli confessed her love to the child.

She kissed his forehead, exchanged trivial jokes, and sang lullabies lying in the same bed.

And as she did so, she thought.

‘……I still want you to smile.’

She hoped he would be happy even if he became spoiled by excessive love, rather than growing up too fast.

Perhaps that was why she had returned, she thought.

She dreamed such dreams.

[This is the timeline separator]

While engrossed in conversation with the child, not realizing dawn was breaking.

Knock knock.

“Young master. You weren’t in your room, so I came to check if you might be here.”

The head butler of the main house knocked on the door.

“……”

-It’s okay to open it. He’s not a scary person.

The child looked back at Aeli, then slowly nodded and tiptoed to open the attic door.

Soon, the face that met the child’s said.

“The duke has ordered your return to the main house. Let’s go prepare now.”

It was time to return to his rightful place.