Chapter 124 – #27_Staggered (4)

#122

One.
A field road to the east, out of the hut and out of the cypress forest.
If you walk along the road for about 30 minutes, you will come to a low hill.
The hill where you can put your buttocks on without losing a breath is densely covered with shoots of wild blue barley that have survived the late winter.
The barley, which has not been tamed by human hands and stretched out in its natural state, boasts jade-colored leaves full of vitality and turns its head to and fro in the wind.

Amelia and Siu each spread their easels while leaning against an unknown tree planted in the middle of the hill.
I started painting with a wooden board fixed to the back of my easel to keep the paper from blowing away in the breeze.
Amelia quietly drew her lines and captured the scene in front of her on canvas.
There were many places around the cabin that could be used for landscape painting, but Amelia’s favorite place was this barley hill.

However, even during her picnic with Siu, Amelia kept moving frantically between her pencils.
It was because Siwoo, who was unusually silent today, was just looking at the drawing paper with a blank expression.

“Siw.”
“……”
“Siw.”
“…Yes, Miss Amelia.”

He did not meet her eyes when Amelia called out to her.
The tip of the pencil that is being shaken is just scribbling meaningless lines on the white paper.
Amelia was no fool either.
She had fully guessed his condition and current situation.

“Are you hungry? Well, I didn’t eat breakfast.”
“It’s okay.”

But the moment you put it in your mouth.
The moment she tells him, she just pretends not to know because she is worried that her sweet dream will be broken into pieces without any room.

“Today, I also added lots of salmon, which Siwoo likes.”
“It’s really fine. I have no appetite.”

Amelia bit her lower lip hard.
An ensemble of nervousness and anxiety led to an uncomfortably fast heartbeat.
She spoke again in the same voice as usual, the way she used to talk to Siu while living together in the cabin.

“Siwoo, you told me before. When holding a pencil, use your fingertips… Oh!”

Amelia’s arm, which was trying to fix Siwoo’s grip on the pencil by squeezing it on the back of her hand, is thrown away.
Amelia, who was thrown back by Shiu’s fierce resistance, stood still.
She couldn’t accept what had happened.

“I’m sorry, Ga, are you mad at me for suddenly holding hands? Is it because of what happened yesterday…?”

Siwoo’s hand, which held the pencil without looking at Amelia, trembled slightly.
She started talking again as if nothing had happened.

“Siwoo must be in a bad mood. I think I was too careless… I’m reflecting. I’m sorry… That’s why I take my anger out…”
“……”
“Or is there really no place where you feel uncomfortable? Shall we go back and rest together?”

It’s like if you do this, everything will be nothing.
As if the catastrophic day she had been postponing so long would never return.
Close her eyes and pretend not to know.

Siwoo’s eyes turned to Amelia for the first time.
Amelia thought those eyes looked like supercooled water.
I imagined that although she was calmly chafing at the moment, she would freeze like a snowflake at the moment of the slightest shock.

Amelia bites her lip and holds back her cries as she continues her words.
She smiled sadly and looked at him.

“Today… When we get home, let’s have tea together. Milk tea and scones are good, right? I also bought some butter at Taro Town the other day.”

A vain hope that disappears like foam.

“After that, I read until evening… I also study magic, which Siwoo likes. After having dinner together, how about looking at the stars together? Lying on the roof and watching… Siwoo liked it too.”

She puts in her mouth a happy day that probably won’t come.

“It’s been a while since we slept together. Now that Siwoo has grown up, the bed may be a bit narrow, but I will sleep on the side. Then, after that…”

What to do next?
What’s next

Drop by drop.
Siwoo’s expression did not change even though the tears began to flow, messing up Amelia’s eyes.

“I know… I already know…”

When Amelia pretends to be a little flustered, Si-woo, who was worried about her, is no longer there.
Siwoo, who kindly comforted me when she shed tears, is no longer there.

“Come back, you’re back… Completely.”
“Yes, Associate Professor Amelia Marigold.”

The terribly selfish dream of a spring day has come to an end.

2.
Amelia sat down in her seat.
Siu looked down at her.

It felt like her heart would be torn apart.
The fact that Amelia, who was dearer to her than anyone else, is weeping over her own callous behavior, in itself chokes her.
I wanted to get down on her right now, hug her, and comfort her.
She wanted to hold her little body in her arms and stroke her hair and whisper that it was okay, that it was okay.

Because Amelia did it too.
Amelia also pampered her young Siu, showed her a beautiful and simple happiness, and she always made her Siu smile and make her heart tremble.

So that.
She couldn’t be more forgiving.

In her tangled mess of memories, Amelia,
She was smiling
She was laughing
Shiwoo in the midst of mixed emotions like muddy water.
She was in love
Was hating

“Why did you do that?”
“Ugh… Ugh… Black…”

Amelia tried to say something of hers, but each attempt was swept away by her tears and sobs.
Siwoo habitually looked for a cigarette.
But no cigarettes.
Siu nervously brushed his collar.
Pretending to be relieved, he forced himself to confess in a raised voice.

“It is as the associate professor said. All my memories are back. When I woke up at dawn, I remembered everything, everything.”

Siu pulled Amelia’s arm.
Amelia staggers to her feet, led limply by his hand like a puppet whose threads have been cut.

“I was thinking about what to do. Do you know how it feels when the person you love and respect the most in the world suddenly becomes the person you hate and hate?”

Rather.
If only I hadn’t lost my memory.
Rather.
If Amelia hadn’t been nice to me.
Rather.
If only she had been the ugly Amelia all along.
Rather.
Once she stopped liking her.
At least I wouldn’t have felt this fierce sense of betrayal.

If it hadn’t been for the melting pain in her heart that I felt when she looked at her face, she grimaced in agony as she hugged Amelia.
A little less would have hated her.

“I was worried. Can’t we just skip it? Can’t we just forget everything in the past? Or this fucking feeling, the vomit-like confusion, the sense of betrayal… Really, how can I get it back? Can I repay the feelings I felt a hundredfold a thousandfold? I thought and thought and thought again.”

Amelia’s intentions are unknown.
He wonders why he was so kind to Siwoo, who lost his memory and became a child.
He had no clue as to why he did this.
I wanted to repay you.

This sense of betrayal that makes my teeth tremble,
This feeling of loss when the person I trusted more than anyone else turned into the person I hated the most in this city overnight.
He wanted her to share the feeling of being thrown into the air.

“But I don’t think so. I can’t go that far.”

But can’t.
I couldn’t bear to do that.
Shiwoo’s right eye, where the blue cold air flowed, was bleeding.
He staggered and grabbed Amelia, who was barely standing.

“So, convince me. Why why why. I wonder if I was the one who had to suffer that shit. Tell me the reason why I have to be so confused because of you belatedly pretending to be nice to people and just stir up people’s moods.”
“Siw…..”
“Leave this!”

Amelia’s pathetically stretched out hand landed terribly on Siu’s arm.
Amelia froze in a daze because she was afraid that Siu, who was not another person, was pouring out such fierce eyes, desperate resentment, and hatred.

“You think I still can’t remember anything?”
“Siwoo, Siwoo… Da, I’ll explain everything… Don’t be angry…”

How could Amelia’s frightened, trembling appearance look so repulsive?
She wasn’t like this before.
He always looked at Siwoo with a cold face and a stern gaze, and left the harsh work without any mercy.

Everything was considered pretentious.
The truth is, anyway, even if she was changed by her experience of nearly losing her useful sidekick.
Siu can’t understand.
The two images could not merge in my head.

A slave must not climb on her sorceress.
Fighting emotionally with Amelia of the 22nd hierarchy is like walking on her blade.
But Siu didn’t care.
Compared to the anger and betrayal he felt now, the weight of his life was less than a single feather.

Amelia stumbled over and hugged Siu.
Without a word of response, she forcibly digs into her tightly closed elbow and forcibly hugs his torso.

“I’m sorry… Siwoo, it was my fault… It was all my fault… Forgive me… Forgive me… I’ll do anything to get it… Please, please…”

Amelia’s apology, barely audible, mingled with sobs.
Even so, she digs right into her ear like an awl.

However, Siwoo’s heart did not calm down in the slightest.
Rather, it was only time to reconfirm that the bullying in her memory was a childish act.
I can only feel the realization that it really happened.

“Tell me why. I just need to tell you why she bothered me. Because that’s what I want to hear.”

Amelia looked at Siu.
Siu looked at Amelia.

“Because I love Siwoo…”

Amelia said what she had been wanting to say all along.
She pours out her words to him that she couldn’t convey.

“It was only after I almost lost Siwoo… I was able to admit my feelings… I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”

Siwoo felt his pulse run out.
It wasn’t because it wasn’t as great as I thought it would be.
Just for that reason, just for that superficial reason.

Even the image of her taking care of Si-woo, who has changed to a young age, is covered with the thought that it was just her greed.
She was, after all, selfish from start to finish.
Amelia was selfish from beginning to end.

“If you hate me that much… From now on, I’ll also live in a barn… It’s okay to treat Siwoo like a servant until he feels better… It’s okay to bully him… So please, please forgive me…”
“Miss Amelia.”

Seeing Siwoo’s voice softened a bit, Amelia looked up at him cautiously, expecting a bit of her.
And the moment her eyes meet hers, she realizes what a vain expectation it was.

“I asked if you could forgive me even if I get my memories back?”

Cowardly.
If only he had thought for a minute or even for a second what kind of feelings Siwoo would have for her after he regained her memory, and what kind of despair he would fall into.
She shouldn’t have said that.
Never.
That much could not be forgiven.

“Stop it now, I forgive you.”

Amelia read in his pupils.
Deep resignation and disillusionment.

“Please, don’t do that.”

He felt every string linking him to Amelia snapping.

“What? Because I forgave you. It turned out as Amelia-sama had wished.”

Amelia backtracked and eventually collapsed onto her floor.

“Because the slavery certificate was also destroyed. I’m sure I’m not Amelia’s exclusive slave. But since you are a baron, I will treat you with the utmost respect.”

Finally, one word sharpened by Siwoo severed all remaining strings.

“Siwoo, whom Amelia-nim loved, is dead. No, it wasn’t even there in the first place.”

Amelia awaited his final sentence, her eyes glazed over as if she had no strength to shed her tears.

“Siwoo, who loved Amelia-nim, also died. The same goes for this.”

Siwoo, with a bitter sneer, folded the drawing paper and took the easel.
Amelia couldn’t hold on to Siu’s back as he trudged away.

“Oh right. I must say this.”

Siwoo suddenly stopped.
Before Amelia can even hold out her hopes, her last words fall.

“You are terribly selfish.”