Chapter 99 – Gaze (6)
Lucia nodded her head with difficulty at the condition Grace gave. The look in Grace’s disbelief-filled eyes made her shudder shallowly, but at the same time she felt deserving.
Now that she herself is unsure of her own actions, she cannot trust others.
Even as she passed her unknown days alone in her empty house, she kept asking herself.
I wonder if I feel sorry for her sister now.
Are you sincerely sorry for what you have done?
Do you hate Isabella?
But she couldn’t come up with an answer that came close to any conclusion.
It was no lie to say that she loved her with all her heart, to hate her Isabella,
And the weight of what she had done to Mason was too heavy for her not to feel guilty.
Most of the day, she stayed motionless on a dusty bed.
I was constantly looking back at the inner conflict that I could never get down on my own.
The memories of the past that remained in my head like a stigma were vividly repeated every day.
Every time she saw Isabella, the sense of exhilaration that filled her heart.
The sense of superiority Mason felt when he was precariously dependent on himself.
The uncomfortable nausea she felt as she picked up her letter without even thinking about it.
That’s why, rather, the choice Grace came to her and made her feel a little more at ease.
Okay. It’s better
You know very well that she did something unforgivable.
Even if you tell me to hate Isabella, I’m not confident.
I can’t do anything. I screwed everything up so much that nothing can be fixed.
Sister and me too. With my own hands.
So, I’m going to do the best a coward can do.
I can’t leave her sister like this, and she can’t shamelessly offer help next to him,
Let’s help Grace get her sister out and run away.
Alone, without anyone knowing.
It was certain that he would no longer be able to see Isabella the way he used to, and that Mason would not be able to treat her sister the way she used to.
Lucia thought that while looking at Grace. Grace made eye contact with her for a moment and asked,
“Listen. I don’t trust you I’m not interested in whether or not you’ve made a change.”
Grace’s sharp golden eyes stared intently at Lucia,
“I don’t care if you’re plotting to betray me. But if you’re uncooperative, or if you betray me, I can promise you one thing. Mason is always dead. At this rate, slowly, surely, and painfully.”
She whispered, leaning more towards Lucia.
“So, if you really felt something from those letters, you’d better cooperate with me.”
Lucia nodded her head, and she said, bringing her tilted body back to her chair.
“Do you know Isabella well?”
As she opened her mouth, she hesitated for a moment. Wasn’t he trying to devise a plan to save Mason?
Sensing her doubts, Grace waved her hand in annoyance.
“It’s all necessary, so answer me first.”
Lucia reflexively tried to say yes, but then stopped. Lucia knew only what Isabella had decided to show her to others. She was adept at cleverly twisting, cheating, and using her words for her own ends.
Of course, ordinary people don’t even know this, so it could be said that they know it well compared to others. But, of course, I knew that Grace’s question wasn’t asking this.
Lucia remembered Isabella’s lilac eyes. She has eyes that do not reveal her true inner self, like a black curtain that refuses to allow any light to penetrate.
Seeing Lucia shake her head, Grace thought for a moment before opening her mouth again.
“Tell me everything she knows about Isabella. I like her family circumstances, childhood, habits, and tastes.”
Lucia began to talk, retracing her now faded past, and Lucia began to listen to her story in deep thought.
“…”
Mason looked into the small box in her hand. A glass bottle containing a small amount of liquid. And there was a syringe.
But Mason’s gaze did not stay on the liquid. She was not in pain at the thought of Sianna receiving her injection, and the tears that had flowed as before were dry, as if they had stopped.
Her hands were now quite deft, opening the bottle and pouring the potion into her syringe. Sianna’s thin, pale arms showed her veins all too easily. She skillfully tied her rubber band and pushed her injection under her skin.
The feeling of needles piercing my skin, which had been so terrible at first, was no longer thrilling. All I had to do was find her blood vessels in the order I was used to, and insert her needle into her arm.
Mason dabbed her injection mark with a cotton swab dipped in antiseptic, then she rolled up a new rag and lowered the sleeve she had rolled up.
“…”
Mason pressed her finger lightly to the corner of her own haggard eyes. Ignoring the headache that shimmered in her head, Cianna slumped in the chair next to her bed as she lay there,
Even if she closes her eyes just a little, the flood rushes like a tidal wave.
For Mason, her physical exhaustion was eating away at her spirit little by little.
Now, a series of emotional exhaustion that had recently occurred, which had weakened her body and mental power incomparably with her past, were tormenting Mason as if they were symbiotic.
A daily life where you can’t relax, an anxious and hopeless situation. Simple tasks that are repeated every day.
At least one normal person would have been broken long ago.
And Mason had to watch her unconscious Sianna every day, haunted by her regret for herself and her guilt over her condition.
Anxiety soon became insomnia, and insomnia led to chronic fatigue. Her constant fatigue slowed her down, and it was slowly but surely leading to the death of her feelings.
The pain she felt every time she saw her was slowly blunting. In the past, the tears that flowed just by looking at Siana became more and more frequent.
Her trembling hand, which she had brought under her nose, worried that she would stop her breath, now, without hesitation, placed her hand on her chest to find her feeble beat.
Her gaze, which had been anxious to see if she would come to her senses or if her pupils were looking at her, was helplessly relaxed, or sometimes darkened due to her inability to win.
When he came to his senses, he felt a little guilty, but soon the fatigue more than before severed Mason’s thought circuit again.
Little by little, Mason felt the shadow he had been trying to hide from being cast.
Clear and sure despair.
Giving up seems so obvious now.
Mason looked up at the two uninvited guests across the bed from her bed.
-…
The eyes attached to them were more like empty holes than eyes. It was watching Mason closely. She glimpses her desire to devour her soul, her everything that makes her up.
Mason, however, did not take her eyes off the two of them. The more I looked into their eyes little by little, the clearer the shapes that made up their bodies, like twitching skeins of black thread. The clearer she felt, the deeper it felt as something in her heart sank.
As she sank, she felt stillness. Silence, not anger, fear, or sadness.
Even if it doesn’t get better.
I thought I might not have to feel any more pain.
-…
The two shadows stared at Mason without doing anything. Mason, too, did not take his eyes off them. The longer their eyes crossed each other, the more blurred their vision, and their bodies shook as if they were shaking.
It shakes precariously, as if it will break if brushed against.
It’s hard.
Unpleasantly.
Mason flinched at her in shock, then opened her eyes, feeling pain in her head, arms, and back. Placed on the cold floor, her body was as heavy as a thousand pounds, and the throbbing and rumbling head made her feel nauseous.
And looking down at her like that, it was Jennifer with her expressionless expression that didn’t even feel her emotions.
– When did you come?
As she opened her mouth and moved, she felt her voice travel along her vocal cords, but no sound was heard. But what Mason felt was neither fear nor dread, but fatigue.
Rather, is that Jennifer?
Mason wasn’t exactly sure. Her eyes were open but out of sharp focus, and even then they were rapidly blurring.
Jennifer’s mouth seemed to open.
I’m sorry, Jennifer. I can’t hear what you’re saying
With the last of those thoughts, Mason lost her mind.
