On the day of Penelope’s graduation recital, the Utterbacks were on their way to congratulate their daughter when they were involved in a car accident.

Burdened by the guilt of knowing that her parents had died while coming to watch her perform, Penelope sank into a deep depression.

Although others called her a genius violinist, she felt that her talent was more of a curse than a blessing. It had led to her being exploited by her music teacher as a child, and ultimately caused her parents’ deaths.

It was a single flower that pulled Penelope out of her despair. Thanks to the iris that someone had left by the practice room window, she found the courage to carry on.

Just as she was wondering who could have comforted her in such a way, Ned appeared.

“I’ve loved you from afar. I have nothing, but I will cherish and love you all the more for it. Please let me become part of your family.”

In the depths of sorrow after losing her family, no words could have been sweeter to Penelope.

Ned had once been nothing more than a thug loitering in back alleys, but Penelope, moved by his sincerity, chose to believe in him—and rushed to marry him.

People scorned her, saying he was a gold digger seducing an orphan, but Penelope felt happy just having something to give to the man she loved.

So she kept giving, even as Ned treated her title and inheritance like they were his to claim.

But no matter how much she gave, Ned’s demands only grew—while love never once found its way back to her.

Though disappointment came again and again, Penelope still found herself boarding the Iris once more at Ned’s request.

Because the one who loves more—the one who needs more—is always the weaker one.

“If you don’t get on the Iris, then we’re over.”

Because of that one line from Ned, Penelope boarded the dreadful voyage—just to avoid being abandoned.

‘If I can be of use, maybe Ned will look at me again.’

The narrow, dim cabin frightened her, but she told herself it didn’t matter—as long as Ned stayed close. If anything, she was grateful. At least it gave her an excuse to be near him.

But as if to mock that fragile hope, Ned never once appeared, despite being on the same ship. Now, a month into the voyage, Penelope was worn down—body and soul.

Today, her migraine had worsened, and she had to secretly slip out of a gathering she had attended at her husband’s request.

Still, tomorrow, at last, she would be able to get off this dreadful passenger ship.

‘At the very least, I don’t want to spend the final day alone.’

Penelope wandered the deck before turning back toward the cabins. Not to her own third-class room, but to her friend Deva’s first-class cabin.

“Penelope, you’re boarding the Iris too? Feel free to visit my cabin anytime.”

Deva had been a friend since their days at the Royal Academy of Arts. After Penelope dropped out due to trauma and withdrew from social gatherings, she was left with hardly any close acquaintances.

It was thanks to her husband that she reconnected with an old friend during a time of deep loneliness.

“I’m going to make it big with my record business! And guess who my partner is? None other than the top violinist, Deva Hoffman!”

Much to Penelope’s surprise, Deva was the first musician to be signed to Ned’s new record company and scheduled to release an album.

Three years on, the friend she had reunited with had become a successful violinist.

In comparison to Deva, who had flourished, Penelope felt as though she had withered away after giving up on her dreams.

Seeing her friend’s dazzling success made Penelope shrink in on herself.

Too ashamed of her petty feelings to voice them, she declined Deva’s invitations for a whole month.

It was only now, with the voyage nearing its end, that she finally gathered the courage to seek out her old friend.

‘Deva will welcome me no matter what I look like.’

Steeling herself, Penelope brought along a bottle of wine as a gift and made her way to Deva’s cabin.

‘Why is the door open?’

Perhaps something urgent had come up. The door was open, and a broken wine bottle lay on the carpet.

A strange sense of foreboding washed over Penelope.

Her instincts told her to open the bedroom door, but her common sense told her to leave the room.

Ultimately, she followed her instincts and peeked through the door.

She had to grip the wine bottle tightly just to stop it from falling.

“Ah… Ned. I love you.”
“Me too—hah—I love you too, Deva.”

What she saw there was her husband and friend tangled together.

Their heads knocked against the wall and the contents of the bedside table crashed to the floor as they devoured each other hungrily.

The husband who had been disappearing every night was there all along.

The sweet expression she thought she had lost was still on his face.

“Where’s Penelope right now?”
“By now? Probably chatting with the senators’ wives. I sent her off to do some PR for the record company.”
“Married women gossiping on a luxury liner? Doesn’t Penelope have a man to keep her company?”
“My wife can’t be fooling around with other men.”
“So you can do things like this with me, but Penelope has to stay faithful?”
“Of course. Until I throw her away, Penelope has to remain the proper wife.”

The two of them laughed in unison, and their laughter soon melted into moans.

Penelope let her head fall limply. Why was her husband in her friend’s cabin? The answer was obvious, yet she wanted to deny it.

She thought maybe she should scream, but strangely, she wasn’t angry.

Because—

‘I already knew my husband had another woman.’

Penelope still loved her husband. She had paid close attention to all his actions, so naturally she had noticed the changes in him.

When he invited Deva to their house under the pretence of being a business partner, Penelope felt a crushing sense of isolation, as if she were sitting alone at the dining table, even though there were three of them.

Despite knowing the truth, she clung to the foolish hope that if she just tried harder, Ned would come back to her.

‘But Deva? That’s just too cruel.’

Of all people, it had to be her friend, who had made her feel inferior for a whole month, who was cheating on her.

Once her suspicions were confirmed, she was consumed by wretchedness.

Unlike the successful Deva, Penelope’s career had been cut short, confining her to the home. She couldn’t bear how pitiful she looked.

“By the way, Deva, are you really going to marry that arrogant bastard, Gunner?”
“Of course. I’m pregnant. The sooner we marry, the easier it’ll be to make the baby seem like the duke’s.”
“You say it so casually… You’re planning to carry my child and live with another man?”

‘Wait… child?’

Please tell me I heard that wrong. Let this be a hallucination born of madness.

He told her it was too early to have children, even after three years of marriage, and yet Deva, his mistress, is pregnant?

“And you, Ned—what right do you have to talk like that to me? I’m the only daughter of Marquis Hoffman, the top violinist, and the darling of high society. Do you really think I’d ever marry a married man like you?”
“Just wait a little longer. I’ll soon take Penelope’s title and become Count of Utterback myself.”
“Didn’t her fake parents make it so no one else could inherit the title?”
“If the family elders back me unanimously, I can have Penelope cast out. The Utterback geezers are furious a woman inherited the title, so they’re being quite cooperative.”
“So what happens to Penelope after you snatch her title and fortune?”
“I’ll toss her into a mental hospital. The woman’s already on sleeping pills—it’s nothing to forge a diagnosis.”
“And after that? I guess the newspaper will print a tragic piece about a woman who took her own life in an asylum?”

“Ahaha.”

The two laughed heartily at their own conversation, then returned to their sordid noises.

The filthier the sounds grew, the louder the ringing in Penelope’s ears became. With her exceptional hearing, she was forced to take in every single word—even though she didn’t want to hear a thing.

Would pretending not to see, not to know, somehow make this nightmare go away?

‘I want to run.’

Unable to bear it any longer, Penelope turned on unsteady feet—

Bang!

A sea breeze blew in through the partly open window, flinging the bedroom door wide open.

“Kyaaa! Who’s there?!”
“What the hell—Penelope?! Are you out of your damn mind? What are you doing here?!”

Ned noticed her and rushed over, grabbing Penelope’s arm and violently hurling her aside.

“Ned… Deva… No, right? I must be mistaken, right?”

Penelope looked up at her husband, eyes damp with tears.

“You saw everything, so drop the act. Hiding and eavesdropping like some creep—what a pathetic joke.”

Ned shouted down at Penelope as she lay crumpled on the floor.

“Deva, you’re my friend… You weren’t supposed to do this to me.”

I was truly happy to see you again. I was jealous—but I still enjoyed being able to talk to a friend.

“Friend? Maybe that’s what you thought. Do you have any idea how tired I was of always playing second fiddle in your shadow?”

Deva scoffed, as if the whole situation was absurd.

“The only reason I became the world’s top violinist is because you disappeared. Someone like you was just an obstacle—I should’ve cut you out of my life long ago.”

“An… obstacle?”

“Shocked just by that? Then how about this—at your graduation recital, when you cried and ran off because your fake parents died? I found it so pathetic, I was actually glad I bribed the driver to finish the job…”
“Damn it, Deva! Why the hell would you say something like that?!”

Ned hurriedly clamped his hand over Deva’s mouth in a panic.

“What… did you just say…”

Penelope heard that ringing in her ears again.
No—this time, it felt as if every sound in the world had vanished, leaving behind a deafening silence.