Anniversary for Sure - 6
When Karl slipped the ring onto my finger, it felt as if the whole world had settled into the palm of my hand. Selfishly—truly, shamefully selfishly—that was the feeling that rose in me, and I spoke it aloud.
How pathetic. Someone who had never even noticed Karl’s wounds, who was only now seeing what she should have seen from the start—what right did I have to savor that joy?
My guilt had been so light, so flimsy, that a single ring could make it vanish.
Not flimsy, though.
A bitter laugh almost escaped me. Right. Not flimsy at all. A ring given by Karl, of all people. Nothing about that could ever be called “just a ring.”
But this was not the moment to accept it with happiness.
“…No. This isn’t right, Karl.”
After a long hesitation I pulled the ring off. It felt as though my chest were being torn into ribbons.
The ring I had longed for more than anything—if I had received it yesterday I would have leapt for joy. Now it felt like a shackle scolding me.
Maybe I was making a scene. Maybe I was the only one drowning in meaningless guilt, and by doing this I was only wounding Karl, who had finally found the courage to offer it.
Even so, how could I accept it? If I still possessed any sense of shame, how could I take this?
“I… I don’t deserve it.”
With trembling hands I held the ring out to him. Karl looked dazed, as if he had never imagined this turn of events.
“I was just lucky. Just… just that kind of person, nothing more.”
A lucky person. The more I listened to Karl’s story, the more that thought refused to leave my head.
Karl, who had lost his first love in the most horrific way. He had not been ready to accept anyone, and no one had been able to approach him.
And yet I had approached him. How? With Father’s power. Even Karl could not refuse a request from Father.
I used the Duke’s influence to draw near a wounded Karl. He still pushed me away with perfect courtesy. And I, knowing nothing of his circumstances, wept that a man had rejected me, that he had dared to push me aside.
Pathetic.
That past of weeping and wailing. It had already been embarrassing; now it was shameful in an entirely different way. I had prodded a man’s deepest wounds and then cared only about my own pain.
After that, when I met Karl at the Academy, it grew even worse. I was thrilled, declaring it fate, insisting that Karl and I were destined to be together—without the slightest knowledge of the wound he carried.
Believing it was destiny, I approached him aggressively, as if I were already his lover. When in truth I was nothing at all.
Selfish bitch.
Harsh words I had never spoken to anyone. Probably I had saved them just for myself in this moment.
I approached Karl knowing nothing. Using my ignorance as a shield, I hacked away at the kind Karl.
As if I knew everything…
When I heard Karl’s heart during the vacation, it truly felt as though I had heard all of him. I thought he had opened himself to me completely.
So I grew arrogant. I told myself I could wait for Karl forever, that his coming to me was only a matter of time.
Even though in reality I still knew nothing. I had only learned that he had lost his first love—not how many tears of blood he had shed over it.
If I had known, I could never have acted that way. I would never have strutted about as if I were the first, or grown jealous whenever another woman drew near him.
“I… I was just freeloading off Karl’s kindness and being unreasonable. Just… a stupid person who approached without knowing anything… I was only first because I was lucky, and that is the only reason I could stay by Karl’s side…”
It was miserable. The tears would not stop. Speaking my own ugliness aloud was driving me insane.
Even more maddening was the knowledge that I did not even have the right to cry. How ridiculous and disgusting must I have seemed to Karl? The woman who clung to him declaring she would be his wife, who cared nothing for his wounds and fretted only about being the first.
“I love Karl. Even if the world collapses, that will never change.”
I forced a smile and continued.
Yes—separate from whether I deserved him or not, my love for Karl remained the same. Even if I knew nothing else, I knew that I loved him.
“But loving him alone does not give me the right to claim his first place…”
I was not the only one who loved Karl. Young Lady Luise, Young Lady Irina, the Demon Duke, and even that subordinate who had confessed to him. There might be others I did not even know about.
Did I have the right to take first place over all of them? Was there anything in which I surpassed them?
Status? Then it should be the Demon Duke who stood first, not me.
Time spent together? Then no one could outmatch the subordinate.
Ah—there was one thing. Being the one who tore Karl’s heart while pretending to know nothing. At that, I was the absolute best.
“So… give it to someone better than me. Karl is kind, so he is offering it only because I was crying too much and he felt sorry for me. You must not mistake that feeling.”
Yes. Karl was embracing even me, who had torn his heart, out of pity. Because I had clung to him so uglily, and now there was no one else I could marry if not him, so he was saving me.
“…Is that so?”
At my words Karl sighed and took the ring from my palm.
Don’t cry. You brought this on yourself. This is right. Better that someone who truly understands Karl takes it, rather than a selfish bitch like me who lived in a flower garden.
“Pardon the intrusion.”
And then Karl raised his right hand and flicked me squarely on the forehead.
“Hyat!”
The impact arrived as suddenly as when he had first slipped the ring on. My body jolted backward and a scream escaped of its own accord.
“You were saying such strange things, so I took the liberty for a moment.”
“S-strange things…”
But I had mustered my courage to say them. To dismiss them so casually as strange…
“Whether you have the qualifications or not—why does Mar get to decide that?”
Even so, seeing Karl’s stern expression, my mouth would not open properly. It was the first time I had ever seen him angry.
“Since Mar spoke as she pleased, I will speak as I please as well.”
At my hesitant look Karl sighed again and continued without pause.
“Frankly, Mar. You are a bit strange.”
Those words stabbed into my chest like a dagger. I had called myself a selfish bitch with my own mouth, yet hearing the person I loved call me strange was unbearable.
“You act confident but you’re actually full of holes, your heart is surprisingly soft so you suffer alone. And you worry about every useless thing under the sun. Sometimes you suffer alone and then flare up alone.”
As Karl’s mouth opened, my head sank lower and lower. So that was how Karl saw me. It was even sadder because none of it seemed wrong.
“But the one who likes that Mar is me.”
My bowed head suddenly lifted. Karl cupped my cheeks and forced our eyes to meet.
“Everything I have seen. Every point I know. I like all of it.”
“Ka-Karl…”
I did not have the courage to face his gaze head-on and tried to turn my head slightly, but Karl would not even allow that; he gripped my cheeks firmly.
“Qualifications? Other than the fact that I like Mar, what other qualifications are needed?”
“Th-that’s you misunderstanding—”
“No.”
Strange. Even in this situation, hearing Karl say he liked me made my heart pound.
“I’m still not very mature. So I show my likes and dislikes far too clearly.”
Karl spoke in a voice a little calmer than before.
“So the things I dislike, no matter how useful, I cut them off. Just having them nearby gives me the creeps.”
But the things I like, even if they try to run, I keep them close.
The softly added words made my whole body tremble.
“So I will pretend I never heard what Mar said earlier.”
After looking into my eyes for a long time, Karl gently drew back and lifted the ring.
“Actually. This is a couple ring.”
Saying that, Karl scratched the ring with his fingernail and it split exactly in half.
“Unique, right? A couple ring made of one piece rather than two. Doesn’t it feel more like becoming one, and better?”
Karl let out a small laugh and slipped the ring back onto my finger.
…This time he did not release my hand, as if he had no intention of giving me time to take it off again.
“Mar did not approach knowing nothing. You did not hurt me.”
And his other hand slowly approached my forehead.
“Rather, when Mar said she liked me, you have no idea how much comfort that was inside. I thought I was a useless man no one could rely on.”
My bangs rose following the path of Karl’s hand.
“If Mar cannot believe in yourself, then believe in me. Because I think there is no one more qualified than Mar.”
The soft sensation of lips touching my forehead.
“Do you understand?”
I could only nod blankly.
Margeta, who had been nodding, soon toppled backward.
She had fainted. She had already been suffering alone, and then she was suddenly hit with a verbal thrashing and an unexpected forehead kiss on top of it; her mental string must have simply snapped.
…Still, looking at her expression she seemed happy, so that was a relief.
Got through it cleanly.
I drew the blanket over the softly breathing Margeta and let out a small sigh.
Thank goodness. If I had failed to settle today’s matter properly, our relationship would have been finished. Even someone with romantic experience as pathetic as mine could tell that much.
I never expected it to be this severe.
I carefully stroked Margeta’s hair. She truly had been suffering from guilt beyond anything I had imagined.
In a way it might look like an overreaction, yet I could understand Margeta’s position as well. Unstable footing caused by the Demon Duke’s sudden intrusion, the man she loved visiting the grave of his first love, and the cold person who never came to her himself.
Events that would be headaches even one at a time had exploded in succession, so Margeta’s composure had exploded with them. Above all, the feeling that she could not serve as her lover’s support. The moment she felt that, Margeta had no choice but to collapse.
I was the same once.
There is no more sorrowful feeling than that. And knowing it full well, I had done the exact same thing. Disgusting.
Out of apology I stroked Margeta’s hair with even greater care. For a woman to say she did not deserve it, please find a better woman than me—how cornered must the situation be for those words to leave her mouth?
I had known Margeta seemed confident yet was secretly soft, but this much—
It’s my fault.
No. Do not shift the cause elsewhere. It is my fault for promising to bare my heart and then baring only half.
While stroking her hair I glanced at the half-ring fitted on my own hand.
Should I stick it back together?
I seriously considered it. The pitiful thing that had gone from a proper ring to a half-ring.
A couple ring made of one piece? What the hell kind of thing is that in this world. This is just one single ring.
I should have bought an actual couple ring.
Maybe because I have not used my head lately, my intelligence has regressed. I bought an ordinary ring instead of a couple set.
I realized it too late and simply split the thing. I worried it might be a magic ring and refuse to break, but luckily when I coated my nail with mana it parted somehow.
…Glad she likes it.
Still, when I put it on the second time, Margeta’s expression was unmistakably a mixture of emotion and pure happiness.
Yes. This is, in fact, a couple ring made of one piece.
From today onward, that is how I will think of it.