Chapter 3

After the day Susan confronted me, we weirdly yet tacitly started giving each other the cold shoulder.

However, she showed up before me far more frequently than before.

I would see her while eating in the cafeteria or on the way home from school.

I would even see her subtly peering around a corner on my way to pick up an exercise book from the teacher's office.

Whenever she caught my gaze, she would pull back immediately.

Yet, I couldn't be bothered to speculate on her motives.

With the exams right around the corner, every second counted.

Three days before the entrance exams, it was a bitingly cold winter night accompanied by a howling northern wind.

I was bent over my desk, reviewing the last few questions I'd gotten wrong, when I suddenly heard a knock at my window.

When I looked up, I saw Susan standing outside the window, her fingers tapping lightly on the glass.

Her nose had turned red from the cold, and her shoulders were trembling faintly. She wasn't wearing a coat, only a thin sweater.

I frowned but didn't move.

She knocked again, her gaze fixed on me.

I could see her mouth moving to form the words, "Come out."

I sighed, closed my exercise book, and walked out of the house.

I was greeted by a cold wind that made me instinctively pull up my collar.

Susan stood beneath a streetlamp, its dim yellow glow illuminating her face as tears clung to her lashes.

"What's up?" I asked.

She bit her lip, then replied hoarsely, "Alfred, let's talk."

"If this is about my university application, forget it."

"It's not about that!" she shouted, abruptly raising her voice.

She quickly lowered it again, as if she was afraid of alerting the people in the house, before clarifying, "It's about you… What on earth is up with you?"

I gazed silently at her.

She took a deep breath, seemingly building up courage, then continued, "It feels like you've become a completely different person over the last few months. You… You evidently weren't like this in the past."

I asked indifferently, "Is that so? That just means I've changed."

"But your change is too drastic!"

She took a step forward, tearing up again.

"There has to be a reason, right? Is it because I wouldn't let you apply to the National University of Defensive Technology? Do you really hate me that much for that?

"Or is it because I did what Dad asked and helped Wilson with his studies? Am I spending too much time with him? Could it possibly be because I haven't agreed to officially date you even though you'd been pursuing my affections for so long?"

The night wind swept between us, carrying withered leaves with it.

It whipped Susan's hair into disarray, but her gaze remained stubbornly trained on me. It looked like she wouldn't accept anything less than an answer.

I closed my eyes and finally revealed, "Susan, I had a dream."

She asked in bewilderment, "A dream?"

I replied, "Yes. A very, very long dream. In the dream, I gave up my chance at enrolling in a military academy for your sake and followed you to Northall University. I thought you and I would always be together and live happily ever after, but it wasn't long before you found someone new.

"However, I was completely unaware and foolishly believed that our love was still mutual. I still obeyed your every word and continued to work toward the future you desired. I didn't care that your father looked down on my background. I simply wanted to do my best to give you the best. Yet, in the end…"

"Later, when I was hospitalized with late-stage cancer, you would sit by my bedside and talk about your marriage to someone else."

Susan slowly paled, reflexively tightening her grip on the hem of her sweater.

She already knew very well who the "new lover" was, and Mr. Lane had definitely belittled me more than once at home.

Moreover, based on the timeline, she had also already developed some feelings for Wilson.

Still, she remained stubborn.

"It's… It's just a dream, and dreams aren't real. It won't actually happen!" she argued.

"Really? Susan Lane, can you swear it?" I asked.

She fell silent. She didn't even dare swear an oath to me.

I laughed bitterly and pulled my coat tighter around myself. "That dream felt so real—real enough that when I woke up, I found myself never wanting to make the same mistakes.

"Susan, I understand that you're a very outstanding person, so I won't pester you anymore. You can follow your own heart and your father's advice. Interact with whoever you wish to."

She continued to stare at me, tears finally rolling down her face.

"So, you said all that… just to inform me that you're dead set on leaving me?"

I said nothing.

The cold wind howled, sweeping her tears away and onto the frozen ground.

Susan began in a choked voice, "Alfred, if… if I told you that I won't treat you like I did in the dream, then would you—"

I interrupted her. "I wouldn't. Susan, the dream simply opened my eyes to one thing—we were never meant to live in the same world."

Her shoulders trembled violently, as if my words had struck her deeply.

She suddenly became agitated, and she yelled in a tearful voice, "What gives you the right? Alfred Grant, you clearly liked me first! You were the one pursuing my affections! But now, how can you just decide that you don't want me anymore? What right do you have to do this, Alfred?"

I gazed silently at her without retort.

Seemingly angered by my silence, she grabbed my arm so hard that her fingers were practically digging into my flesh.

"Look me in the eyes! Have you fallen for someone else? Is it Melinda Lewis? Or is it Mandy Churchfield? Tell me!" she demanded.

I gently pried her fingers off my arm one by one before replying in a quiet but firm voice, "I'm not in love with anyone else. I just don't want to love you anymore."

Her fingers froze in midair, and large, fat tears rolled down her cheeks.

"Alfred… Would you still not want me anymore even if I told you that we can start dating now and that I would sort everything out with Dad?" she asked.

I'd never seen such a meek side to Susan.

I wavered momentarily at her puffy eyes, but I quickly stomped out the feeling.

I let out a barely audible hum and replied, "Yes, I still wouldn't."

She staggered one step backward as if my words had destroyed her, then turned and ran.

The cold wind escorted her into the darkness of night while I remained where I was. I didn't move for a long time.

It wasn't until my mother, Lily Ingram, called out to me from inside the house that I came back to my senses. I rubbed my frozen fingers and turned to head back inside the house.

The study materials I'd spread out on the desk rustled in the wind.

I sat down and continued working on the questions.

This time, nobody would be able to sway me from my path.