“It’s just a simple fever. It seems she caught a chill after getting wet in the water. Being exhausted could also be a contributing factor. Once the fever subsides, she’ll wake up soon.”
“Who wouldn’t know that? It’s just a simple fever, so why can’t she regain consciousness? It’s been days, and she can’t stay awake for even ten minutes. Can it be normal for someone to sleep for so long without any other issues?”
“When the fever goes down…”
“When on earth will the fever go down!”
Herald shouted, pushing aside the doctor who kept repeating that it was only a fever due to a cold. He slumped onto the sofa. His anxiety, like blood drying out, didn’t subside while he was guarding Retina’s side.
Having lost consciousness due to a high fever, Herald carried Retina, and headed towards the palace close to the square. Holding Retina, who was breathing out a damp breath from the fever, he entered his bedroom.
After reaching the palace because the royal physician was called in advance, the diagnosis was quickly followed by the call. At the same time, Herald tore off the clothes stuck to him, and there was a moment when the maid came to him.
However, Retina had been sleeping as if dead for several days. When Herald asked if it wasn’t a severe condition that Retina woke up briefly to eat some soup and medicine and then fell asleep again forcibly, the doctor simply replied that she was just resting.
Day after day, hearing the same diagnosis, Herald was spending each day in hell. One day, consumed by anxiety that Retina might stop breathing suddenly, like she did at the lake, he couldn’t even find comfort in sleep.
“It’s just overlapping fatigue and fever, so she’s just taking deep rest. Don’t worry too much. It’s not a serious illness as you fear.”
The doctor, adjusting his crooked glasses, spoke to the prince, who couldn’t take his eyes off Retina. From the perspective of the royal physician, he was more concerned about the prince’s health, who had been fasting for days like her.
“Are you getting any sleep at all?”
Even though the time for delusions had arrived, he asked about the prince’s condition, who didn’t take any medicine, despite the possibility of hysteria when fatigue overlapped. “The lack of sleep and overlapping fatigue can lead to hysteria. Until now, it has been found that hysteria has a close relationship with psychological stimulation.”
Fortunately, there were no external signs of the disease. However, hysteria was a concern about when it would burst, as it was being pushed to the limit and could cause sudden seizures.
“As long as she’s by my side, I don’t need to worry.”
Brushing aside the doctor’s concerns, Herald wiped his tired face and looked at Retina lying in bed.
Having stayed by her side constantly, he didn’t even feel the onset of hysteria. Rather, feeling lighter, he felt he couldn’t afford to let his body waste away without reducing sleep.
He would rather be tormented by hysteria himself. Retina couldn’t wake up, and he felt selfishly healthy in her company more than ever.
His princely status was useless to his lover lying in bed. Despite being wrapped in incessant anxiety and despair, he felt helpless, but he did his best within the limits of what he could do to Retina.
“If there are any symptoms, please call me. I’ll send medicine through the maid.”
The royal doctor greeted him behind his back, as if he were accustomed to the prince not seeing him. Until the doctor left the room, Herald, who had not moved at all, responded to the sound of whimpering as if having a nightmare.
“Please, don’t leave me… Don’t leave me alone…h-hngh….”
Frowning, he grabbed Retina’s hand, which squeezed the sheet. Although she hadn’t completely consumed food, her hands, which were losing weight, looked noticeably bony.
“I’m here with you. You’re not alone, Retina, please.”
Herald brought Retina’s hand to his forehead, and pleaded with a voice filled with pain. As he wiped the tears flowing down his face, he looked as pained as Retina.
If only he knew what was tormenting her, he could have shared the pain together.
Watching Retina suffer alone brought him the heart-wrenching pain.
As always, he didn’t leave her bedside until Retina’s nightmare was over.
* * *
Retina hated rain. Especially the weather when thunder rolled and poured down heavily.
The sensation that came to mind when it rained with thunder, the sky roaring as if it would collapse, the thick rain beating against the roof, the damp and clammy air. And Mother’s icy hand, cold like ice.
When it rained with thunder, these sensations clung uncomfortably to Retina.
Retina looked around the cabin, unchanged from her childhood. On days when rain poured enough to tie a horse’s feet, Mother took her own life alone in the cabin.
Witnessing death for the first time in her life, Retina didn’t understand her mother’s death. No matter how much she called out, there was no answer, and her mother, who had gently stroked her head, simply fell into a deep sleep, she thought. So she talked next to her, listened to her sleep, and held her cold, clenched hand tightly.
Without her mother, the young child couldn’t even start a fire to cook food or bathe. But Retina never left her side. Even though they said she left her alone, for Retina, there was only her mother.
She lay quietly beside her mother, deep in sleep, waiting for her to wake up.
Until the duke arrived with his two sons at the cabin, guided by a meaningful letter, cutting through the rain.
Retina looked up along a faint beam of light illuminating the dim room. Her expression shifted slightly as she saw her father and brothers, clad in reversed raincoats.
Until then, Retina didn’t realize the situation she was in. It was when she saw her father, tears streaming down his face as he held their mother in his arms, taken away first by her brothers.
So that’s death. Death is a sad thing.
Mom is gone, she thought.
Since then, Retina followed the remaining family out of the cabin. She didn’t utter a word until the funeral procession took her mother’s body away. Even after her mother’s funeral.
The doctor who visited the mansion diagnosed Retina with mutism, which lasted for over a month.
The Duke didn’t urge or plead with Retina, who had mutism. He simply left her alone, grateful that she was alive and allowed her to do as she pleased.
Her two brothers also tried to restore Retina to her former liveliness by occasionally visiting the mansion while attending the academy.
And as time passed and Retina healed from the wounds in her heart, she uttered her first words: ‘I want to go back.’
With that memory ended, the surrounding scenery changed, and darkness fell all around. Retina, now grown from a young body into adulthood, found herself suddenly left alone in the darkness.
Though she had missed her mother as an adult, Retina had never recalled memories from her childhood like a scene in a play that continued. She clenched and opened her hands, confirming her senses in the dim space where only the silhouette of her body could barely be seen. She wandered aimlessly, unable to grasp a thread or find her way in the dimness. She didn’t even know which direction she was going or where she was.
Just when she thought everything was really okay now.
As Retina recalled memories buried deep in her heart, she looked down at the pierced hole in her chest.
I thought it would get better when I became an adult. I thought time would dull the pain like healing a wound. But I completely forgot that deep wounds turn into scars that last a lifetime.
Retina covered the hole in her chest with her palm. Yet, the moment she pressed her palm against it, the hole only partially obscured, never completely filled.
Like how thoughts of her mother’s death would unexpectedly intrude, no matter how hard she tried to avoid them.
Retina stood still in place. She thought she had forgotten everything, but it was a grave mistake. Deep down, a part of her still sought the young self who never returned, searching for her mother.
Should I follow my mother like this? As she pondered, a bright path appeared in the darkness, illuminating her thoughts. At the end of that path, the beam of light she had seen in the cabin emerged.
“I’m here with you. You’re not alone, Retina, please.”
Pausing her steps towards the warmth that could be felt just by looking at it, Retina hesitated. She had been captivated by memories of the past, forgetting someone very important.
Retina stared at the end of the path. If she went there, she would meet the person she longed for, but her feet didn’t move easily.
“There are people waiting for me.”
Retina withdrew the step she had just extended and returned to where she started. As she steeled her heart, one by one, the paths in front of determined Retina disappeared.
With a new emotion filling the empty hole in her chest, Retina placed her hand over it and looked at the fragmenting pieces of light with a distant gaze.
“Goodbye, Mom.”
Her expression as she bid farewell to her beloved looked somewhat relieved.
