Chapter 2

I recognized that man. He was Derek Hall, someone belonging to the same social circle as I did. He had even attended my birthday banquet a decade earlier. I placed the bowl of ravioli before him and replied calmly, "It's just to make a living."

Derek froze for a second, probably caught off guard by my response. He looked down and took a couple of bites before suddenly remembering something. "Hannah and Mia returned to Halport. Have you heard about that, Theo?"

I stopped wiping the table for a brief moment and replied, "No."

Derek looked at me, as if he regretted bringing it up. He could only keep going since he had already started it, though. "I heard Isaac's heart condition flared up. Hannah and Mia both went along to his follow-up. They made quite a huge scene out of it."

He hesitated briefly, then looked at me warily. "If you had married one of them back then, things wouldn't have turned out like this…"

He didn't finish the rest of his sentence. He probably thought that it was too cruel for him to continue after catching sight of the bandage over my eye and my severed finger.

I merely smiled faintly and said, "Please enjoy your meal."

Derek lowered his gaze and fell silent.

I turned around and went to tidy up the kitchen, where an old photo hung on the wall.

I was 18 years old, dressed in a white suit in the garden of the Webster residence. Dad stood behind me, while Hannah and Mia stood on either side. I had been young and confident back then, smiling brightly like someone who had never faced any storm.

A corner of the photo had been scorched black from the smoke. It had been the only thing I had rescued from the Webster residence after the fire. It had also been the thing I had held tightly in my arms the day I lost my right eye.

I felt my phone buzzing again. It was another message from my 18-year-old self. "They came to pick me up for the engagement banquet. Is it really impossible for me to trust them?"

I kept staring at the message, feeling a tight sensation in my chest.

Just then, the bell above the door chimed again, and two women walked in from the rain under black umbrellas—one appeared soft and graceful, while the other appeared confident and radiant.

Hannah and Mia were still as stunning as ever, even though a decade had gone by, looking as though time had left no mark on them.

They both stopped in their tracks the moment they caught sight of me.

Mia spoke up first, her brow furrowing deeply. "T-Theo? How did you end up like this?"

Hannah looked at the back of my hand, red from the scalding soup, before moving her gaze to my missing ring finger. She then asked softly, "You've been making a living selling ravioli all these years?"

I remained silent. I turned my phone over on the table, but even so, the screen stayed on. That message from the 18-year-old me was still plainly displayed. "Is it really impossible for me to trust them?"

I smiled faintly as steam billowed from the boiling soup, blurring the sight in my only remaining eye. "I've been doing fine."

Mia looked as if she had just heard something ridiculous, her brow furrowing deeply. "You've been fine? Do you even see the state you're in right now, Theo?"

Mia had always been like this. It was just that back then, she used to scold other people instead of me. "Those who lay a finger on Theo answer to me!"

She eventually directed her anger at me. "Why do you have to make things difficult for Isaac, Theo? He's had nothing since he was young and has always been at someone else's mercy. He's already suffered enough. Is it really that hard to yield to him for once?"

I lowered my gaze and slowly wiped the water stains on the tabletop.

Hannah looked at me, speaking far more gently than Mia. "We never knew things would turn out this way back then, Theo."

I stopped what I was doing. Hannah brushed off what happened back then so easily, yet that was the moment my lifelong nightmare began.