Chapter 3
My Mother Has Been Possessed (3)
Rattle.
When Aria, holding Bonita in her arms, opened the store door and entered, the woman who was reading the newspaper inside was startled.
“Welcome… Aria? What are you doing at this hour, taking Bonita with you?”
“… Haha. Why don’t you give Bonita some clothes for her to wear?”
“You’re buying Bonita clothes?!”
Aria’s face contorted into a grin at the shocked response. Bonita raised her hand and squeezed the front of her mother’s shirt..
The small gesture melted Aria’s expression. Renee, an apprentice at a high-end clothing store and Aria’s drinking buddy, looked on in disbelief.
“Uh… My boss is not here right now. You’re going to see it as the cheapest one anyway, right?”
“No!”
Aria quickly shouted.
“Not the price, but what would suit our Bonita best… No, I want something pretty at a reasonable price anyway.”
“As I live, I see all sorts of things.”
Normally, Aria didn’t care about her daughter at all. She fed her, but she treated her more like a dog than a child.
She finds her moderately cute, and then complains that it’s annoying. Sometimes, when she gets angry, she holds her daughter and mutters someone’s name like a crazy person.
In Renee’s opinion, Aria was a strange mother, and not in a good way.
But today, she’d even stopped by the store to buy Bonita an outfit for a night out, in a place where wealthy commoners were the main customers.
Renee muttered something about the strangest things in the world, and ducked into the back of the store.
“Here, I’ve got about twenty, if you need more.”
“Thank you.”
Aria smiled when she saw the cute children’s clothes hanging.
“Come on, Bonita! Let’s try them all on.”
“Um, everything?”
Bonita shouted in surprise.
Twenty clothes?
That’s more outfits than she’s ever worn in her life, Bonita thought.
‘I might never stop changing clothes!’
Needless to say, that didn’t happen.
Bonita, who had been Aria’s doll for about three hours, reached for the mirror in a dazed mood.
She had a cute handprint on the mirror. Her Bonita’s pink eyelashes fluttered.
‘Nonsense!’
The light blue dress was made of silk fabric and even had real lace sewn into it one by one.
Bonita stroked the white lace and ribbons on the front in wonder.
Although it was far below the clothes worn by the nobles, this soft fabric was a new world to Bonita, who always wore old clothes.
Aria looked at Bonita with her mouth open.
‘I wish I could have gotten you something nicer.’
One year old, two years old, three years old…
At seven years old, she’s still so adorable and cute that I want to bite her, but I can’t help but feel sad to think about what she was like before that.
Aria smiled bitterly and stroked Bonita’s head.
“Shall we take that?”
“Yes! Ah, but…”
It definitely seems expensive.
As Bonita’s complexion darkened, Aria pinched the child’s cheek painlessly.
“Don’t worry. From today, we will become the richest person in this country.”
“Yes?”
The words ‘The richest person in the country’ Bonita was lifted three centimeters off the ground again.
Bonita cried out, squeezing her eyes shut, prepared to take a few hits.
“Mother, you can’t gamble! It really doesn’t work!”
“… Did she gamble too? Isn’t that XX really crazy?”
“… Yes?”
“Oof. What should I say in front of the child?”
Bang bang!
Aria slammed her head against the wall twice and then she grinned.
“It’s nothing. Come on, let’s go outside.”
Bonita’s pink eyes widened at the sight of her mother’s behavior.
‘I wonder what happened to her…?’
I’ve heard it before. People drink too much alcohol and lose their minds.
In fact, there were many people on the streets who were consumed by alcohol and drugs and became living corpses. Men were beaten and robbed of everything they owned, but women were often worse off.
And Aria is a dazzling blonde beauty.
Her imagination took a turn for the worse.
Bonita grabbed the hem of Aria’s skirt with a contemplative look on her face.
“Mother…!”
“Do you want a hug?”
Bonita was in Aria’s arms in an instant, and she was being flirtatious. There was no time for anger.
‘Oh, what should I do?’
Could it be that my mother is really crazy?
Her little head filled with confusion. Aria took hold of the carriage again while Bonita grunted inwardly.
“To the Duke of Lysianthus!”
“At your service!”
The coachman replied cheerfully, and took the reins.
After closing the small window to the coachman, Aria set Bonita down beside her. So the small, skinny child who was not much taller than her did not fall down.
“Mother, why are we going to the duchy?”
“Bonita. From now on, listen carefully to what your mom says.”
Gulp.
Bonita clenched her fists and swallowed hard at the seriousness of his tone. Still, she couldn’t think of anything good.
‘Is my mother trying to sell me out?’
There were surprisingly many noble families who wanted young girls, especially cute girls like Bonita.
Bonita remembered a man looking at her before and saying, “Pink hair, a rare color. You’ll get a lot of money for it if you sell her to a noble family.”
Aria came to visit her afterward and was incredibly angry, saying, “Selling her to a noble family? How dare you say something like that!” But even so…
I remembered the money she lost gambling last month. Aria’s behavior is such that she spends so much money on herself in a situation where she’s not regret every penny.
‘I guess that’s it!’
She is well fed, clean, and dressed in nice clothes. She may really be thinking of handing herself over to a noble family.
Bonita panicked. Throughout her life, she had expected this day to come someday, but when it became a reality, she was terrified. Bonita didn’t want to be separated from Aria.
“Bonita, you are actually the Duke’s only daughter.”
“No, I don’t like it! I want to live with mother!”
The two people’s words overlapped.
Aria and Bonita blinked as they belatedly heard what each other said.
“You want to live with me…?”
“Yo-you weren’t trying to sell me to a Duke…?”
“What?”
Aria’s mouth dropped open at the absurdity of Bonita’s imagination. At the same time, her anger at the ‘Aria’ who had raised her to think such thoughts boiled over.
A spark flashed in her blue eyes.
“Mother…?”
Right. The kid is watching.
Calm down, calm down.
Aria, letting her temper die, poked Bonita’s nose with her very stern face.
“There’s no way mom would sell you, you should never imagine something like that.”
“Yes…”
“And, you are indeed the daughter of Duke Lysianthus.”
“Yes?!”
Aria, seeing the child’s shocked face, smiled mischievously.
“When Luke sees you, he will immediately recognize you as his daughter. There’s no way he wouldn’t know. Lysianthus said they could definitely recognize their own blood.”
“What…”
Bonita wanted so badly to refute Aria’s statement, but her mother looked so excited that she couldn’t.
‘I’ve never seen my mother’s eyes sparkle like that.’
Aria was a beautiful woman with an aura of exclusivity that was hard to find in the narrow countryside. Even when she was drinking and being intoxicated, the decadent aura was such that many men would knock on her door.
But Aria’s eyes were always empty. She had no light, as if she were not alive.
She often looked aimlessly into the distance, as if searching for something she had lost, and each time Bonita trembled with fear that her mother would just disappear like this. It was also scary to hear her mother hugging her and muttering someone’s name.
Even though it hurt, it was much better to get hit or pinched a few times. Because when Aria gets angry, at least she doesn’t look like she’s dead.
But now Aria was like the afternoon sunlight shining brightly.
Silence settled inside the carriage. Bonita shifted her hips and crept closer to her mother.
Tuk.
As Bonita’s hand touched Aria’s, Aria’s eyes twinkled affectionately. Her gaze filled with affection turned towards Bonita.
“Do you want to hold hands?”
Before Bonita could say yes, Aria squeezed the child’s hand tightly.
The warmth from her grip made Bonita’s fingers twitch in response.
*****
It was late at night when the two arrived at Duke Lysianthus’ house. Bonita looked at the clock, which read nearly midnight, and was relieved that at least they would be sleeping nearby tonight.
My current mother looked as if a fairy had cast a spell on her.
However, a fairy’s magic can be broken in an instant, so after a night’s sleep, the mother may come to her senses and try to return to her normal life.
No, it had to be that way.
However, Aria’s actions always exceeded Bonita’s expectations. In a bad way.
“Let me meet His Excellency the Duke!”
“… Aria?”
Dalton, the gatekeeper, recognized her and his eyes widened.
Aria was a maid who worked for the Duke of Lysianthus for a long time.
The former Duchess had loved her dearly and treated her like a friend, so it was impossible not to recognize her face if you had worked for the Duke long enough.
Besides, Aria was a beautiful woman who was hard to forget once you saw her.
“Are you alive? After Madam passed away, you suddenly disappeared, and everyone was whispering that you were dead.”
“No offense, but I have a favor to ask of the Duke, so please escort me. I’m sure he’s still working.”
Was Aria like this?
Dalton blinked at the confident attitude that did not look backwards.
