It Seems Like The Infamous Trash Can is Right Here! - Chapter 159
I watched him, rubbing at the tight ache in my chest.
Usually, the phantom pain settles where the wound once was. But this time, the pain wasn’t in the wrist, it was in the heart.
When healing a wound, the visions make me the one being healed. The emotions he felt at the time flooded through me, as if they were my own.
The grief and despair of perhaps never seeing the person you love more than life itself tore through my heart. The pain was so staggering that the actual wound on his wrist barely registered.
‘I… I abandoned Lionel.’
Just as I’d suspected, he and I had been lovers in the memory he lost.
We shared the same goal, worked side by side, and endured failure after failure.
Still, even with time rewound, we remembered one another. And because of that, we could hold on, no matter how hard it got. We carried a love left unfinished.
But for whatever reason, I, Serenia Solen, chose to end it.
‘How could I do that?!’
I screamed inwardly at the Serenia Solen of the past.
At the past version of me who had so cruelly wounded a man who loved her so fiercely he couldn’t even hate her.
It was monstrously selfish. Vicious beyond belief.
If that was really me, then I wanted to strangle her with my own two hands.
“…Serenia?”
His voice reached me as I shook in rage at myself.
“What’s wrong?”
Lionel had opened his eyes at some point. He was looking at me with concern.
His gaze was filled with tenderness, and that alone was enough to bring me relief. It meant he hadn’t seen what I just saw.
Because if he had, there’s no way he could look at me like that.
“I think I’m just… a little tired.”
I quickly gathered myself and gently stroked the wrist where his scar had vanished.
“Did you recover anything?”
He nodded.
“I recovered many memories. Especially memories from my first life.”
The first life. Thank goodness, it had nothing to do with the vision I’d just seen.
“I see. If you need time to process, should I step away for a moment?”
“No, that won’t be necessary. Having you here is far more helpful.”
I smiled softly at that.
To give myself something to focus on, I started fastening the cuffs he’d unbuttoned earlier. Then wandered off between the shelves, pretending to search for a book.
Bit by bit, the pain in my chest eased.
My thoughts, too, began to settle.
‘There’s no way I could have hated him.’
There must’ve been another reason I ended things. A reason strong enough to make me choose to leave.
‘Maybe… it had something to do with why Lionel lost his memories.’
It was just a feeling, but it clung to me.
‘What do I do now?’
If I keep helping him recover his memories, one day he’ll remember that moment too.
Naturally, hesitation was inevitable.
Right now, what we have is full of warmth and tenderness. But once he remembers, it would be inevitable that love mixes with hatred and resentment.
If I see that in his eyes, will I be able to bear it? Will I accept it, as the punishment I deserve, and endure it with grace?
As I stared down at the list of books I’d picked out, biting my lips without realizing it, Lionel came up beside me.
“Can’t find the one you want?”
I pulled my expression into something passable and nodded.
“Volume Two and Three are missing from The Five Sisters Under the Blue Roof.”
I brought up a novel I’d been reading lately. It was true that a few volumes were missing, probably someone borrowed them and forgot to return them.
“….?”
Judging by Lionel’s puzzled expression, it was clear he’d never touched anything like that.
“The Five Sisters Under the Blue Roof is a story about five sisters in a village. Each of them falls in love and gets married.”
“Ah, I see. So you’re missing the middle volumes. I’ll have to go buy them right away.”
