Which would be more hopeful, Cas.

Grandfather gave me a key. It was the key to the only locked room in the small two-story house. A place I hadn’t bothered to enter, a place grandfather hadn’t casually left open.

My parents’ bedroom.

I didn’t want to receive the key, but I couldn’t not receive it either. My throat was choked up, so I couldn’t ask where the painting in the corridor that connected you and me came from.

Next time, I’ll definitely ask next time.

If I follow that clue, couldn’t I also learn your true feelings, which have been d*mn consistently absent?

It’s an absurd imagination.

I know.

I’ll wait for your reply.

October 24th

Sent by Asha]

[To Carol

Am I obsessing over you? Maybe that could be it.

I’ve been clearly sending signals for months like this, and the fact that I can’t stop the letters makes me really sick of myself too.

I’m really sick of myself.

It’s not such a surprising emotion. Though I pretended to be cool-headed in front of you, though I sometimes pretended to be rational to the point of stiffness, I……

It’s meaningless elaboration, so I’ll stop.

At first, when you were Aila’s ‘young lover,’ I mocked you. Now I’ve become the one clinging disgustingly. Are you satisfied?

If Aila knew, she’d click her tongue saying I can’t let go of attachments in strange places.

If it were Aila. If it were my smart sister who drew a line treating correspondence with someone whose face she’d never seen as entertainment and perfectly separated it from reality.

It’s all because I’m stupid.

Or I was naive enough to be stupid.

I’ll wait for your reply.

November 17th

Sent by Asha]

[To dear Carol

Grandfather passed away.

I miss you.

I miss you.]

※※※

Is it possible to miss someone you’ve never met?

Such questions were unnecessary now.

Asha, wearing mourning clothes that reached her ankles, gazed at the sky beyond the window then turned her head. The letter where Asha’s breath had melted stretched upward without wavering, as always.

Following that end, there would be the person Asha desperately longed for.

“I miss you.”

Once words came, what followed was easy.

The hand that had been fidgeting with the silver necklace stopped. Her hair tied down in one bundle was decorated with the white ribbon she always wore.

“I miss you……”

The funeral proceeded quickly as soon as Aila arrived.

While the girl who had lost her guardian didn’t know what to do, adults who had connections with the deceased actively lent their help.

The sister who received her younger sibling’s letter arrived in five days aboard her husband’s ship. After that, all procedures went ‘smoothly.’

Thanks to people who had to hold funerals once every few years, or two or three times a year if unlucky, Asha only had to grieve with peace of mind.

Unlike Aila, who was stepping on her hometown for the first time since marriage, she was leisurely—yes, leisurely.

But like how remnants of the sea remain where storms have swept through, Asha’s heart couldn’t be buried in grief alone.

Grandfather had died.

The person who had protected Asha all her life had disappeared.

More than that fact, being unable to share this loneliness, this chill, this bewilderment with anyone tormented Asha more.

Probably, almost everyone on the island embraced Asha and prayed for her grandfather’s soul.

Everyone seemed to understand the sense of loss of a girl whose twentieth birthday was not far away.

No, they couldn’t know.

Because the person involved hadn’t spoken.

Because she couldn’t tell anyone……

“What are you going to do now?”

“Huh?”

“What do you want to do? You’re going to be an adult soon too, so you should choose.”

The old, large body had shrunk and become bone dust. Right after following custom and letting traces of the dead flow into the night sea, Aila asked her younger sister.

Blue-green hair exactly like Asha’s. Gray eyes that didn’t resemble her.

The woman who had been the most mature in Asha’s world raised her eyebrows and urged an answer. The accumulated fatigue and sadness couldn’t fade Aila’s beauty.

“Right, since we’re talking about it. You’ll be an adult in a few months, what are you planning to do?”

“Letters……”

Instead of discussing her own future, her dry lips contained a question she’d postponed for almost four years.

“Letters, why did you end it that way?”

“What are you suddenly talking about?”

“Carol.”

Bewilderment. And absurdity.

The two emotions spread through her gray eyes with a slight time difference. Meeting eyes that seemed to reproach whether such things mattered now, Asha opened her mouth again.

“To Carol, why did you have to……”

Because it felt like if not now, she’d never be able to ask.

Questions postponed for later might be buried when and how, no one knows. Asha waited for an answer while thinking of the secretive painting hanging in the corridor.

※※※

[Aila says she doesn’t like me but hopes I’ll do well.

When I said ‘That’s contradictory,’ my sister said those two weren’t much different. Calling it ’emotions with one root.’

I don’t know.

Hating me while saying she’ll take responsibility for me. Saying I’m bothersome while still asking me about my choices.]

Like a habit, she created sentences to explain to Carol.

It was already a thoroughly ripened habit. Asha, who had been arranging crude words in chronological order, bit her lips and recalled the past conversation.

‘Do you want to stay in Iota? If you want to stay at my house, that’s fine too. There are plenty of spare rooms.’

‘Aila finds me bothersome.’

‘Yes. We’re only four years apart, but you were exceptionally high-maintenance.’

‘You think Mom died because of me.’

‘Because it’s true.’

It was a dry affirmation.

It was a tone that felt no emotion whatsoever, like explaining history from hundreds of years ago.

‘I did think whether Mom needed to give her life to give birth to you. But so what? For the next two months, I’m your guardian. That won’t change.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I’m your sister.’

As if it were a wasteful question, Aila’s answer ended there.

The sister who married one of the kingdom’s wealthiest men appeared wrapped in jewels and fabrics Asha had never even seen. Aboard a personal ship more expensive than those.

The sister who left the island had become leisurely enough to extend her hand to a younger sister she didn’t even like.

The voice that emphasized ‘Think straight.’

“If you suddenly say that, what am I supposed to do?”

She had thought about the future, but didn’t know she’d have to decide so suddenly.

Bash was helping his relative’s work in Delling. Rosette had long since been able to handle her share at sea.

Even kids three or four years younger than Asha knew exactly where and what work they should do.

Her insides burned feeling like she was the only one wandering. Aila had strategically caught a wealthy man around this time to plan her future.

Only Asha……

Knock, knock.

“Asha. Um……”

The sound of knocking cut through her thoughts. The room’s owner, who had slipped from the stairs of self-blame she’d been building step by step, quickly got up and pulled the door handle.

The boy who hadn’t taken off his mourning clothes moved his lips before opening his mouth.

“Are you okay?”

She couldn’t answer the customary greeting customarily.

When Asha caught her breath for a moment, Lucio waved his hands quickly and admitted his mistake.

“No, you wouldn’t be okay. I asked something pointless. Sorry. Well, um.”

“You came to say goodbye since you’re leaving tomorrow, right? Thanks for everything.”

The boy who had decided to stay on the island until he came of age was scheduled to return to the big city following his father. The optician who couldn’t leave his son in a house without a guardian bought two return tickets as soon as he heard the obituary.

A talkative, troublesome friend like a water buffalo.

Lucio sat awkwardly on the chair fitted to Asha’s body and spoke haltingly.

“Uh, yeah. …… Did you eat something?”

“Ah.”

She couldn’t remember the last food she’d swallowed. As the time to find an answer grew longer, her sharply extended eyes crumpled miserably.

“I have no appetite.”

Asha, who muttered like making an excuse, reflexively looked beside the bed. Paper, ink, and pen were placed exactly as they had been years ago.

Only there was no letter to reply to.

Lucio, who had been staring at that sight, scratched the back of his head then carefully advised.

“Still, you should eat.”

“You sound like grandfather.”

The faint laughter stopped.

As the corners of her mouth that had risen by inertia fell, the temperature in the bedroom seemed to drop too.

The window was firmly locked, and grandfather had changed it to thick curtains a few weeks ago. Yet a chill swept in.

Carol.

Dear Carol.