Guidelines for the Perfect Goodbye - Chapter 290
âNot that. âŚFor someone who seeks revenge to think about what comes afterâthatâs just greed, isnât it?â
She had forgotten. The future given to her was like a railroad track leading straight off a cliff.
No matter what she did, her limits were clear. Twenty-seven. She might die earlier, but never live beyond that.
When she had counted the seasons on her fingers, the end would be near.
And yet, here she was wishing for something so trivial as personal attachment. She ought to finish what sheâd started instead of dawdling. Acting leisurely.
âI never even expected love in the first place.â
So why did she keep longing for what she didnât know? Why did she have to resemble her mother in even this? Cecilia scoffed at herself, lost in such presumptuous delusions.
It couldnât be helped. Maybe it was another inherited instinct, her inability to easily let go of lingering feelings.
Since every place that had once given her affection in her previous life had become a ruin, she must be fixated on friendship now. Truly, sheâd thought it would be enough just to give up on love, but the limits of attachment knew no end.
Then, suddenly, she thought,
âHave I truly given up on love?â
Was she fooling herself, thinking sheâd let go of every attachment, when she hadnât, and mistaking that for having given up on love as well?
***
Things with hard shells usually have soft insides. The reason they bundle themselves up so tightly is to hide and protect that vulnerable core at all costs.
She was no different. Affection deprivation. She wouldnât deny it. The fantasy of love. She couldnât say it had never existed.
Thatâs why she loved Logan. She thought if she loved him like a sunflower, he might reward her, at least once, someday.
But love was not the kind of feeling that automatically returned if given. Hatred, if given, always came back. Even if you never offered it, it found its way to you. For some reason, love never worked that way.
Even though she knew she had to let it go, she still couldnât rid herself of her attachment. She would not deny it.
She still had lingering feelings for Logan.
Because the Logan of this life had given her no reason to hate him. Because he even regarded her kindly.
When the man she had once loved with all her years approached her, young again, and reached out to her first, there was no way her heart could remain firm. No matter how much she pretended otherwise, she was inevitably swayed. Such was the foolishness of being human.
But Cecilia was afraid.
She never knew when he might turn his back on her again. When he might, claiming to despise her, twist his words and drive the knife in.
If she expected anything, she would collapse all too easily. To live out this short life and die that way⌠Wasnât that too cruel?
His change of heart was as frightening as her past love. And she didnât love him as much as she had in the past, either.
So in the end, fear won out.
No matter how many times it repeatedâŚ
âMilady, youâve got a letter⌠Um, the sender isâŚâ
Again, this.
Mary hesitated, but handed over the letter when Cecilia reached out.
Loganâs initials were written in a crisp, unadorned hand. He was an honest man, never bothering to hide such things, now or in the past.
Letters continued to arrive. She still hadnât replied. The content hadnât been worth responding to, nor was there anything so important that it merited a reply.
But since an opportunity had arisen to send Christian off in league with her father, she had to ask Logan his intentions as planned.
Do you really bear a grudge against the Pierce Duchy? And if you do, what kind of revenge do you seek?
From Ceciliaâs perspective, she wanted to hand the Pierce Duchy over to Logan.
Not because she was particularly fond of him. She swore that wasnât it.
The property the Pierce Duchy had stolen from her in her previous life had originally belonged to Logan and the Harper family anyway.
So if the Pierce Duchy were to collapse, it was only right that the remainder not go to her, but to Logan.
âAssuming, of course, that he wants itâŚâ
Cecilia carefully penned her reply. The quill, which usually glided across the page for other letters, kept stopping today. When she wrote his name in ink, she thought her fingers might have trembled just a little.
Logan Harper.
A man who said he was stopping by the central region to help his grandfather. A man who told her, if she needed anything, to let him know in advance.
How is this the behavior of a man whoâs been jilted?
âItâs because you do things like this that IâŚâ
She pressed her forehead to the back of her hand, still holding the quill. It felt as if her legs, draped over the chair, had suddenly sunk into the floor.
Even though she knew this wasnât a place she should fall into, she was sinking into it anyway.
Stupidly, foolishly.
