I Wish You Well In Your Next Love, My Love - Chapter 60
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Sleep that I couldn’t shake off poured over me for a long time.
Maybe it was instinct trying to run away from a reality too hard to endure.
Even though I could feel sunlight pouring over the blanket, it was hard to open my eyes.
“Agh…”
If not for the pain and dizziness spreading from head to toe, I would have slept until the sun rose the next morning.
I could feel Gerard moving outside the blanket.
Heavy footsteps paced around me as if wandering about the bedroom, then I heard him head into the living room and leave the house.
Relieved by the sound of the iron gate closing, I sank back into a deep sleep.
“Louize.”
But the careful voice shaking my shoulder pulled me back to consciousness.
“Eat breakfast.”
The voice speaking to me gently sounded like part of a dream.
All I could do was lie there under the blanket, breathing out hot breaths quickly.
Was it because the air trapped inside hadn’t escaped and was hot, or was it because my body itself was hot? My head was burning fiercely.
I could feel beads of sweat continuously running down as though linked tail to tail, but I gripped the blanket tightly.
“I know you’re not asleep.”
It was only difficult to speak as if nothing was wrong, so I had kept my mouth shut, but Gerard, misunderstanding it as me pretending to sleep, added another word.
“Fine. I won’t tell you to eat…”
Holding back the faint whimper that was trying to slip out, I strained my hearing.
“Can you at least show me your face?”
“…I’m sleepy, so I’ll just sleep.”
My voice came out slightly hoarse, but considering that it was morning, it wasn’t especially strange.
“Aren’t you going to the temple?”
“I can go late today, so…”
“Can they really run classes that loosely right before Foundation Day? I should say something to the temple.”
“N-No, don’t! I just want to sleep in.”
“……”
The reply that had come back right away cut off abruptly.
How many seconds passed? That brief silence felt like an eternity to me.
“I’m leaving first, eat breakfast. If you go out, take a carriage. I’ll make sure it’s arranged.”
“I will.”
Normally I would have refused, but I didn’t even have the strength left to argue with him, so I agreed meekly.
I could feel him, who had been sitting on the edge of the bed, rise to his feet.
As I lay there curled up, I found myself clinging unconsciously to the sound of his footsteps gradually growing farther away.
A breath escaped me, one that might have been a laugh or a sigh.
Because behind my wish for Gerard to hurry up and leave me behind, another wish was raising its head, the wish to hold onto him.
Pathetically. Miserably.
Sleep. Just sleep instead.
It was just as I closed my eyes again after they had started to open slightly.
Bang!
The iron gate slammed shut so violently it sounded as though the house might collapse, and hurried footsteps pounded across the floor as they rushed closer.
I was still clutching my startled heart, unable to understand what was happening, when,
“Hiic.”
The blanket was suddenly yanked away.
Cool air clung to my sweat-soaked skin, and the breath that had been trapped burst free.
But it didn’t feel like relief.
Rather…
My chest tightened as if I were about to die.
His eyes, wide with shock, swept over me from head to toe without missing a thing.
The bruises mottled across me, the badly swollen face, the cuts on my face, even my ragged breathing.
He saw it all.
