Chapter 33

With heavy steps, Isu returned and washed her body in the lake water. Afterward, she finished her laundry, fed the roe deer, gave it water, and cleaned the fish.

Killing and dismembering the thrashing, jumping fish was so horrific that she screamed several times. Hearing those screams, the roe deer mournfully cried along.

The yard became a total mess, but she endured it by imagining Hayden eating it with a delicious expression. Afterward, she filleted the fish and put them into a tin can about the size of a face.

The long cooking process began. After simmering the fish in salt water, she mashed it up and added ground almonds.

Even a moment of distraction would burn it, so she stirred incessantly with a branch. Thinking her shoulder was going to fall off at this rate, she switched hands and stirred when she sensed a dark presence behind her.

In an instant, the fine hair all over her body stood on end. Thinking that Declan—that Declan had returned—her wrists trembled violently.

Fearing she would be attacked if she looked back, she stood up as if she hadn’t sensed a thing. Just as she was about to sprint toward the quarters, a familiar voice came from behind her.

“What are you doing?”

It was Hayden’s low baritone.

“Hayden…?”

Checking Hayden’s presence by looking back, Isu slumped helplessly onto a rock.

“Hayden… Haah, I almost passed out.”

“Why?”

“I thought Declan had shown up. Since I thought you were sleeping in the quarters, I never dreamed you’d be out here.”

Expecting Hayden to be in a great mood after a long, deep nap, he instead asked with unexpected coldness.

“Where have you been all this time?”

“……”

“Our promise to let each other know our destination before going anywhere. Wasn’t that an unspoken rule between us?”

Isu hesitated. She had actually been planning to ask him where he was off to herself… She shrank back under his narrowed, coldly gazing eyes.

“…You looked so exhausted, so I quietly went out and caught some fish. Were you out looking for me?”

Brushing the dirt and dust from his forearms, he replied,

“Yeah, while feeling like I was being tortured.”

Feeling like he was being tortured…

The word Hayden chose gave her a strange feeling.

It hadn’t even been a month since they first met. Was the disappearance of a woman he had shared a single kiss and a single sex act with really as agonizing as being tortured?

She couldn’t know his true intentions, but the illusion of having become someone precious to him felt nice. Because it created the reciprocal illusion that she, too, had someone precious to her.

Just as her heart began to tingle, the smell of soup wafted up from below. The soup was on the verge of scorching yellow and sizzling.

Hurriedly, Isu stirred the fish soup with a branch.

“No, no.”

The chewy fish flesh and almonds blended together to create a wonderful aroma.

Still, if she hadn’t made something like this, she wouldn’t have caused Hayden trouble yet again.

“……”

Would it have been better just to stay put? What on earth should she do to make him feel good?

“Would it have been better if I hadn’t made something like this and just stayed by your side instead?”

Dejected, Isu pulled the tin can out from the bonfire. Soon placing it on top of a rock, she stirred it once more.

Hayden’s eyes reflected the dejected woman stirring her soup. Though she looked disheartened, she was blowing on the soup to cool it down quickly so she could feed it to him, taking the rising steam full in the face. It was a sight he had never witnessed from any woman up until now.

For a fleeting moment, he wore a strange expression—neither smiling nor crying.

“……”

Only the sound of the wind she blew from her lips echoed desolately across the yard. Easing his sharp gaze, Hayden sat down next to Isu.

“You’re going to roast your face off.”

Unidentified dish though it was, unless she told him its name, the smell was good. Peering inside the tin, he asked,

“Why did you make this?”

As Hayden showed an interest in her cooking, Isu’s gloomy eyes slowly brightened.

“You looked like you were hurting a lot today. Since there’s no medicine, I wanted to make you eat at least some food to help you get better.”

She wasn’t certain if he’d be pleased by something like this. Shrinking back once more, she watched as he reached his hand out in front of her knees.

Bruised and hard. A violent hand, as if anything it touched would shatter. That hand twitched as if urging her, then opened wide.

Isu placed the plastic spoon that had come inside a pack of corn soup into that hand. Then, holding another spoon with his other hand, he opened his palm again.

“Your hand.”

He was telling her to give him her hand. Isu placed her own hand atop his palm.

Delicately scanning her hand, Hayden wore a worried expression.

“It’s red.”

“It was my first time prepping fish, so I fumbled a bit.”

“You even got wounded.”

His reassuringly steady baritone tickled her ears. That voice melted away the exhaustion of the whole day in an instant.

Gazing up at him with her dark eyes, Isu replied softly,

“It’ll be that much more delicious, then.”

The bonfire crackled and burned. Ash floating up into the air threatened to drift into the soup tin.

Refusing to allow that, she blocked the opening of the tin with her body. It might look strange to anyone else, but she didn’t want to throw away even a single drop of soup.

“No… My shoulders almost fell off mashing the fish and grinding the almonds. It’d be such a waste to scoop away and discard the parts the ash touched.”

Brushing the floating ash away with his hand, he settled Isu down properly and said,

“You startled me.”

She had expected boilerplate pleasantries like “It looks delicious” or “Thank you.” Instead, what came back was that he was surprised. She couldn’t help but ask why.

Isu raised an eyebrow.

“Surprised? What surprised you?”

Hayden gazed at the soup, which was gleaming with a lustrous sheen inside the tin.

“You’re the first person who’s ever made something like this for me without expecting anything in return.”

She couldn’t believe those words. Just what kind of world had he lived in…?

Shaking her head as if to reject that notion, Isu replied,

“There’s no way…”

He spread his legs and moved the soup tin between them. Then, stirring the soup with a spoon to cool it down, he said,

“Nannies and chefs get paid weekly wages.”

“A nanny? You were raised by a nanny?”

“My parents were too busy.”

Though she had anticipated he grew up in affluence, she hadn’t expected him to be raised by a nanny.

“Ah…”

What must it feel like to be raised by someone playing the role of a mother in exchange for a weekly wage?

Naturally, he couldn’t have received a satisfying amount of love and attention, but she wanted to comfort him somehow.

“Even so, you must have been loved a lot by your parents when you were a baby.”

Suddenly, she imagined Hayden as a baby. An adorable child with eyes as blue as the ocean and warm, gray hair.

Which parents wouldn’t have loved that child? She could guarantee that anyone looking at him would have fallen in love with him.

Isu’s eyes, imagining the baby, became saturated with affection.

“Because all babies are pretty and lovely.”

In contrast, Hayden’s eyes were unusually desolate, like a landscape struck by a heavy blizzard.

“My mother neglected me the moment she gave birth. She originally wanted to have a child through a surrogate, but changed her mind, got pregnant herself, and then regretted it. Because of morning sickness, the inconvenience, and all that.”

Even hearing his story with her own ears, she could hardly believe them. His mother wanted to have a child through a surrogate? And then changed her mind, got pregnant with him, and regretted it?

It felt like listening to an event that happened in a completely different world, or a story straight out of a newspaper article. Any desire to wrap his mother in understanding, assuming there must have been another reason, completely evaporated.

“Are there really… people like that in this world?”

“There are.”

A cold answer, like that of a cold-blooded person, reached her ears.

Her heart felt as though it were freezing over at those words. Picturing an infant abandoned by its mother, Isu squeezed her eyes shut.

“You still grew up well, despite all that.”

When she asked back, his pupils were as dull as a dying star.

“You think I grew up well?”

Isu hesitated, unable to answer right away. Because just yesterday she had heard about the things his mother did to him around the time he first started having wet dreams.

While teaching a son not to father an illegitimate child was right, the method had been far too extreme and ruthless. Kindness and mercy must have been impossible to find in a mother who raised her son that way.

Only his physical body had grown up well; his mind might well be diseased. His sometimes unstable pupils seemed to serve as proof of that fact.

She stared intently into his richly colored eyes. Even though his eyes were as beautiful as a newly born universe, viewed from a different angle, they were filled with nothing but opaque vitreous fluid.

Though rich with the essence of all creation, they were ultimately empty. That might be why she was drawn to him. Because being reflected in those eyes plunged her into the illusion of becoming the sole existence in the universe.

Releasing a long, ragged breath, Isu said,

“E-Even so, in my eyes, it looks like you grew up wonderfully. Whatever you lack, you can just fill in as you go on living.”

Stirring the soup again to cool it, he replied,

“If I grew up well, it’s only because I managed to live up to that woman’s expectations.”

“Don’t you have any happy memories with your parents?”

“If there was a family-oriented social gathering once every few months, I might see them. Otherwise, I just spent my time with the butler or nanny.”

The phrase “poverty amidst plenty” suddenly crossed her mind. A hollow emptiness gripped her chest as he continued.

“On stormy nights, my mother would occasionally visit my room. She was terrified of thunder. She probably just worried I’d be struck and drop dead suddenly.”

Narrowing her brow, Isu muttered as if talking to herself,

“Your mother… I just don’t understand her.”

He transferred the soup into a smaller tin. His voice as he spoke next was cold.

“On stormy nights, my mother mostly bragged about a younger sister I’d never once been able to meet. She’d talk endlessly about that child’s personality, grades, and abilities.”

“A younger sister? You’ve never met her once?”

He didn’t answer any further.

The man who had looked like a ruthless beast until now gradually began to feel like an animal suffering from a severe lack of affection. If he had any flaws, she wanted to wrap them in warmth; if he lacked anything, she wanted to fill it.

Cautiously, she asked him,

“…Should I give you a hug?”

It wasn’t an impulsive question. She wanted to press her chest against his and breathe together. Since even a woman who had lost her memories and been found on a remote island was living with a beating heart, she wanted to let him know she hoped he, too, could live happily.

A question that shattered expectations crumbled Hayden’s cold expression.

“What?”

The skin beneath his eyes trembled subtly. While an expressionless face was fine, she thought she wanted to see him smile brightly and comfortably just once.

“I want to hug you. I hope you can feel at ease.”

If she had met Hayden out in regular society, it would have taken years just to say something like this. In the first place, a corporate executive and a reporter operated in entirely different worlds, making it a relationship that could never cross paths.

A very special string of coincidences brought them together on an island. Because it was a precious bond, she wanted to bless him. That was why she summoned her courage.

Carefully looping both arms around Hayden’s neck, she pulled him into an embrace. His cheek brushed lightly just below her collarbone.

He stiffened his body, as if unaccustomed to someone taking the initiative to offer a hug. Soon after, he looked up and stared intently at Isu’s face.

Rather than locking eyes directly, his focus unfurled into a wide, unblinking gaze. It was a barren look, almost as if checking whether the other person was treating him with genuine sincerity.

It showed quite clearly that he had learned distrust long before love.

How pitiful… Pulling his neck down so he rested against her chest, Isu stroked his back.

His broad shoulders extended past the span of her arms. The brief moment of hesitation over the awkward posture caused by their stark difference in build faded almost instantly.

Relaxing the tension in his body, he buried his ear against Isu’s chest. The scent of the breeze clinging to him grew heavier. The body heat pressing against her chest grew steadily hotter.

He was likely listening to the rapidly accelerating rhythm of her heartbeat.