A few days after Philip Averitt, the master of Averitt House, passed away.
[Mother. It’s Louisa.] […….] [You must eat. You’ll become ill like this.] […….] [Mother. ……Mother?]Scarlett Averitt, the mistress of Averitt House, lost her hearing.
Naturally, the Averitt siblings hurriedly sought a doctor. Fortunately, there was still a doctor who would come upon hearing the Averitt name.
However, what they heard was hopeless.
[It seems to be hearing loss due to sudden stress. The best thing would be to remove yourself from the stressful situation…… But since that seems difficult, I’ll only say that the condition may improve or worsen depending on treatment and future care.]She, who was already listless after her husband’s death, became absent-minded like someone who had lost their mind after losing her hearing as well.
The two siblings took care of her with all their devotion.
However, before they could even observe her prognosis, Scarlett Averitt followed her husband who had gone first and passed away.
That’s why Louisa knew as soon as she realized the world had suddenly become quiet.
The same illness that afflicted her mother had come to her as well.
There were warning signs.
From time to time, pain would occur in her ears, and along with tinnitus, the sounds of the world would become distant for a while.
Of course, she only realized those were warning signs after the situation had come to this.
The moment the world’s sounds stopped. In that instant, all sorts of thoughts really crossed her mind.
How much time would have to pass before sound returned this time.
How did I end up in such pain.
Because she felt so pitiful for being driven to the point of breaking herself, truly unbearably sorry, Louisa’s throat choked up.
However, more than those emotions close to lamentation or sympathy, what dominated her mind the most was that her husband must not know about this fact now.
If he knew, he would surely blame himself and once again confine her in the same shackles as before.
And he would just endlessly try to give her something while keeping her seated beside him like a doll as he wished. Not even thinking about how he himself would crumble in the process.
Knowing this, she wanted to speak as if nothing was wrong.
However, it was impossible to understand what he was saying just by reading her husband’s lip movements without sound. His excited speech was too fast to even guess simple words.
So she tried to hurry away.
But even though she had bolted from her seat like that, her husband seemed to have noticed her condition.
Edward, who had been covering one eye and seeming to cry, took out a fountain pen and small portable notepad from his pocket with eyes blurred with tears.
He wrote a few words on the paper and showed it to her.
Written communication.
It meant he had noticed her abnormal condition. Louisa bit her lip.
Edward moved his pen again.
But Louisa shook her head.
Edward’s face suddenly contorted. He shouted something, but all she could understand was the word ‘why’.
Even he who had been saying something in excitement soon realized this fact and closed his mouth. Edward picked up his pen again.
“It’s alright. I’ll receive treatment through the college in Tanacen.”
At her continued refusal, Edward showed a face that was hard to tell if he was angry or sad.
But whichever it was, her answer was already decided. If she went with her husband, he would surely find out what the cause of her illness was, and that was not a situation she wanted.
Edward made what would probably be his final request.
At that earnest plea, Louisa was silent. She could not bring herself to coldly reject and turn away from him who was crying with such an expression.
When she said nothing, Edward carefully brought his hand to the tip of her hand. Then slowly taking her hand, he said.
“I’ll…… see you off. Let’s go.”
With one hand he held hers, and with the other he lifted her travel trunk.
The two of them walked back the way they had come, holding hands with a large luggage bag as if returning together from a trip.
Standing in front of his car, Edward opened the passenger door for his wife. After Louisa got in, he closed the door and opened the back door to load her luggage there.
And so the two of them set off for Lindbrumm Station together.
The road was dim.
In the silence, only the yellow light of gas lamps passed by them, and in the car where neither words nor writing could be conveyed, only silence hung between the two.
On the way, tears welled up in Edward’s eyes several times. But since blurred vision would make driving dangerous, he blinked hard to let the rising tears fall.
After passing through a silence that felt both long and short, the two arrived at Lindbrumm Station.
Despite being a night train departing at a late hour, the platform was quite bustling with people.
Couples embracing affectionately and lovers holding hands tightly whispering their love for each other, whether it was a departing journey or not.
An elderly couple seeing off their son on a long journey, a noblewoman repeatedly asking her servant the time as if waiting for someone to return.
Though their ages, genders, and even social status all varied, the passengers on the platform all had their own poignancy.
Looking at such people, Edward recalled a certain day when the two of them had taken the train to the capital with nothing but meager belongings.
That was probably the last memory of coming to Lindbrumm Station together with his wife. Back then, there must have been such tenderness between them as well.
‘What is my wife thinking as she looks at this scene?’
Edward looked at his wife’s face standing beside him. As if deliberately avoiding them, Louisa was staring impassively at the tracks where the train would arrive.
On an autumn day with falling leaves, he thought of his wife who would have traveled this road alone without him.
His wife whose face noticeably darkened at being told to go alone. Even in that moment, she must have already known scenes like this.
Why did he only realize this on the day he was sending his wife off?
Was it the accumulation of such things that tore his wife’s heart and even took away her hearing?
Ding― Ding―
The bell began to ring, signaling that the train would soon arrive.
At that sound, Edward hurriedly took out his pocket watch to check the time.
The clock hands were pointing to 8:50.
‘Has it already become that time?’
The time printed on his wife’s ticket was 8:55. In just a few minutes, his wife would board the train and leave. That fact suddenly hit him as reality.
Louisa picked up the trunk she had set beside her with her slender arms. Though she couldn’t hear the bell, she seemed to have realized from people’s sudden busyness.
The dazzling one-eyed headlight began to be visible even from the platform. The massive train was approaching, making the ground tremble.
Louisa adjusted her grip on the luggage bag with both hands and turned to look at Edward.
Their eyes met.
“Be careful driving on your way back.”
Though it was about the same volume as usual, her voice scattered into the air with the sound of the approaching train.
Louisa said with a melancholy smile.
“Being sent off like this makes it feel like I’m going on a trip somewhere. But we’ve never actually gone on a trip together like this, so it feels strange.”
Edward could only take in her face with his eyes without saying anything.
“Still, let’s part thinking of it that way. That I’m leaving on a pleasant journey.”
As the train entered the platform, a rather strong wind blew. Louisa’s skirt and hair fluttered in that wind.
“Don’t forget that you have to take care of your own body.”
With a hissing sound of air escaping, the train came to a stop.
People moved forward to board the train. Amidst them, Louisa gave her final greeting with a bright smile.
“Well then, goodbye, Edward.”
Tears flowed down in dots from the corners of her curved eyes. She turned around and climbed the steps of the train.
“Louisa!”
Edward called out her name as she turned to leave.
But Louisa, unable to hear it, disappeared into the passenger car like someone without any lingering attachment.
Ding― Ding―
The loud bell rang announcing the train’s departure. Along with the big sound of steam being released, the wheels made of iron began to move.
Edward unconsciously began to walk along with the slowly moving train.
One step, two steps, and soon he was running across the platform in his leather shoes, following the increasingly faster train.
“Louisa!”
He called his wife’s name as if his throat would bleed.
Maybe she would look back at him through the window. Then he might be able to see her face one more time.
Harboring such a fleeting hope, he ran.
But the train accelerated more and more, leaving the platform. At the same time, the path connected to the station ended. Edward stopped running.
He stared dejectedly at the departing train. His feet hurt, perhaps from running in stiff shoes.
But that wasn’t the unbearable pain right now. There was an emptiness as if a big hole had opened in his chest. Tears poured down from his eyes like blood flowing from a wound.
“Loui……sa.”
Louisa. Louisa. Louisa.
My wife. My beloved.
He could not control the falling tears. His hand and wrist were all damp from constantly wiping away tears.
“Louisa, Louisa…….”
Edward sobbed, calling the name of his departed wife.
For a long time like that, he stood on the platform where his wife had left, crying as if he would pour out all the moisture in his body.
Until the black train melted into the dark curtain, and finally even its tail could no longer be seen.
[This is the timeline separator]Louisa looked out at the pitch-black window.
The train in the middle of the night was quiet.
Nothing could be seen outside. Only her own reflection in the window caught her eye.
From time to time her body shook as if the train was rattling. Yet hearing no sound at all felt very strange.
‘I wonder if Edward returned home safely.’
Louisa found herself thinking of her husband again.
Then she laughed emptily, realizing she was thinking of her husband again, before turning her head back to the window with an odd feeling that was somehow both light and uneasy, remembering he was no longer her husband.
‘This is the first time I’m setting out on a long journey truly alone, with no one else.’
Louisa leaned her head against the window and closed her eyes. All senses were cut off and only the coldness of the glass seeped coolly between her hair.
She knew that a first-class compartment was quite spacious, but she didn’t know it would be this empty to the point of desolation.
Not wanting to be lonely, wanting to be happy, the steps she had taken, but the beginning was achingly lonely.
Starting by abandoning the things she loved meant having to endure all those empty spaces entirely alone.
‘It’s okay. From now on, I’ll be able to build a new life together with my people. So it’s okay…….’
Let’s fill it in one by one from now on.
With those who love me, and times when I can love myself.
She comforted herself as she lay back in the chair.
__________
Turns Out He’s Been Secretly in Love with Me (Female-dominant)
One-line summary: He acts like he doesn’t like her but is actually playing hard to get.
Synopsis:
Xu Muzhou like her. He has liked her for a very long time, and through repeated schemes, he finally closed the distance with her.
But this is still far from enough.
He wants to be the one who stands out among her many suitors, to fight for her attention, and to make her take the initiative to pursue him.
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