“What kind of baguette gets sliced thin like paper… Have you never eaten one before? Or maybe you’ve never cut one? Surely, at least once, you must have seen how it’s done.”

“……”

“You must’ve grown up very delicately.”

Bleria let out a hollow laugh again.

Meanwhile, Gopher, wanting to see her face, raised his head briefly before lowering his eyes, feeling self-conscious. Only then did he notice how the thinly sliced baguette looked pathetic, like a defeated army.

“…I’m sorry.”

“There’s no need to apologize for something like this. It all tastes the same once it’s in your mouth.”

Bleria hesitated momentarily, unsure what to do with the baguette slices. Then, she stacked them on a plate like a crepe cake and handed them to him. She poured boiling water into a dripper already set over a cup.

Gopher instinctively opened his mouth to speak, but Bleria beat him.

“The baguette is special enough.”

Having never brewed coffee before, he had no response.

Years ago, when he tried to pour water into a fireplace, it had been embarrassing, but this moment was far worse, making his ears burn with shame. He couldn’t deny the accusation of growing up delicately. Everything was new to him.

“One foolish mistake after another.”

His fingers twitched uneasily.

Unlike Gopher, Bleria appeared adept. She poured the water in measured intervals, cleaned up the used dripper, and placed a coffee cup on a saucer from the tray. Her movements didn’t suggest this was her first time.

The fact that months had passed since Bleria left Heaven became more tangible.

“Here, drink.”

Steam billowed thickly from the coffee. Bleria sipped the hot beverage without hesitation. Gopher, watching her throat move as she swallowed, blurted out, 

“How can you handle it so hot?”

“Freshly brewed is the best.”

She lowered her gaze toward the coffee and added, “When I was a child, everything I ate was always cold—left to cool down, forgotten. It was usually just soup or bread, though. Maybe that’s why I’ve grown to prefer things hot.”

Gopher couldn’t say a word. His past was filled with countless Blerias waiting for freshly brewed tea to cool.

Perhaps recalling her childhood memories, Bleria seemed to grow pensive.

The two sat in silence for their own reasons until they finished their coffee. The faint sound of a chair scraping brought reality back into focus.

Bleria stood, gathering the empty dishes onto a tray.

“I’ll take care of that.”

“Just to the kitchen… Wait a moment.”

Her eyes suddenly dropped to his left hand. Gopher followed her gaze, and an inconvenient truth came back to him.

It had been a while since he’d shot a crossbow at his own hand as a test, yet the bandages were still there, a reminder of the slow recovery without a priest’s aid. Until a moment ago, his hand had been hidden under the table.

Gopher awkwardly tried to hide his hand, but she caught it before he could. His shoulders visibly tensed.

“What happened to your hand? Did you get hurt?”

“It’s nothing.”

“Nothing? And you’re wearing thick bandages? Were you doing something strenuous with this hand?”

Her voice carried unmistakable emotion.

Is she worried?

Though different, her voice overlapped with the one he remembered the day before.

When he hurt his neck, when he cut his hand on a broken vodka glass—she was worried for him, even though they hadn’t known each other long. That realization surprised him a little and stirred another thought.

What if I got hurt worse?

Would that draw her closer?

As he entertained the idea, their eyes met.

It was the time of day when sunlight grew stronger. Against the backlight, her vivid eyes captured him entirely.

Those eyes seemed to scold him. They looked like they were saying, “You haven’t changed one bit.”

Gopher swallowed his thirst with a dry gulp.

“…I cut myself on a paper-knife. It’s just a scratch, but this was the only bandage available then, so it might seem overdone.”

He couldn’t keep relying on such little lies to elicit a reaction. With the ambiguous distance between them now, such tactics wouldn’t work. He resolved to visit a priest soon.

Unaware of Gopher’s thoughts, Bleria sighed, looking as if she couldn’t help being concerned.

“I’ll take care of the tray. Just rest.”

“I can carry it with one hand.”

“I’d rather not replace all the plates after watching you show off your strength.”

“…”

“If you’re that bored, here, work on this.”

She handed him a set of knitting needles and yarn before walking away.

Naturally, Gopher had no idea how to knit, so by the time Bleria returned, the only thing that had changed was that the yarn looked even more tangled.

***

While staying at Bleria’s house, Gopher created reasons for himself to remain there.

He fixed the window frames and installed sturdy locks to improve security on the windows and doors. He placed self-defense tools around the house and hung the brightest lamp by the front door.

He learned how to properly secure chandeliers and adjusted all the lighting fixtures in the house. Before Bleria woke up, he replaced all the candles.

At first, his clumsy attempts were blatant, but he grew more skillful over time, no longer avoiding her gaze after completing a task.

Sometimes—truthfully, often—Gopher found his own behavior amusing. He was used to proving his worth, but this was the first time he realized he could live like this.

Still, it was good. It felt good.

Though their ways of life had changed, sharing meals in the same house, tackling household tasks together, basking in the sunlight, and pondering how to finish the mountain of bread were moments that brought happiness.

During those times, a quiet longing began to grow. It no longer felt so wrong that Bleria couldn’t remember him.

If only I could start everything over.

Perhaps he could pretend the past—where he had deceived and provoked Bleria—had never happened and forge a new relationship with her.

The guilt and self-reproach for even considering this quickly dulled. So much so that now, even when nightmares taunted him with words like these, they barely fazed him.

In his dream, the Bleria who had been sharing coffee with him again transformed into Selene Pincher and spoke.

“Didn’t I tell you that just staying alive was enough? You really haven’t changed at all, have you, young duke?”

Gopher felt no emotion at those words anymore. Selene smiled with a tilt of her lips.

Once, he had thought that smile resembled Bleria Heaven’s. But after seeing the real one again, Selene’s face appeared entirely different, even in his dreams.

“But tell me, young duke—can the outcome change if the person hasn’t?”

Gopher tried not to react, but she seemed displeased by his silence and stepped closer. He wanted to push her away, but his hands were glued to the table, refusing to move.

Their foreheads touched. Selene pressed closer—more, more—until there was no space left. Where their skin met, it burned with unbearable heat, her face blurring into something unrecognizable, leaving only the light brown of her irises filling his vision.

As Gopher grimaced in extreme discomfort, Selene whispered.

“I think you’ll ruin everything again, don’t you?”

With a lurching sensation, Gopher woke from the nightmare. His blurred vision was filled with a bright brown hue.

A chill ran down his spine briefly, but clarity soon returned. It wasn’t an iris he was seeing—it was the hair color. The person who had woken him from his dream was unmistakably Bleria.

He had dozed off while waiting for her at the dining table. Blinking quickly, he tried to reorient himself to reality.

Yes, this was reality. His illusions still lingered.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, Bl…”

Ah.

He had started to speak without realizing it, but he quickly shut his mouth and jolted into awareness as if doused in ice water. He had almost said her name aloud—Bleria.

Bleria didn’t remember him. She would naturally be on guard if a stranger referred to her by name.

As Gopher covered his mouth with his hand, she tilted her head.

“What were you about to say? Bl?”

“…Bella. Someone I knew appeared in my dream.”

Pulling out the chair opposite him, Bleria sat down and asked, “Who was it? A sibling? A friend? Or… a lover?”

“…”

“A lover, really?”

His reaction gave him away entirely.

At this point, he wondered if his mind had completely unraveled. Internally, he berated himself harshly.

“Does that person know you’re here?” she asked.

“We’re not connected in any way now.”

He barely managed to answer, but a bitter taste lingered on his tongue. Still, Bleria didn’t relent in her questioning.

“Did you break up?”

“…Yes.”

“Why?”

Bleria looked at him with calm, steady eyes.

Gopher knew he should stop deceiving her by discussing Bleria’s story before her, yet he hesitated.

She remembered nothing—she never would. But just because she didn’t know didn’t mean the past had disappeared.

Should I tell her? he wondered. Maybe even the ‘Bleria Heaven’ buried deep in her subconscious would listen to what I say.