Lahat ng Kabanata ng He Chose my Cousin, so I Chose Revenge: Kabanata 231 - Kabanata 240

By late afternoon, the garden had thinned. The larger groups drifted out, their chatter replaced by softer footsteps of those who stayed behind. The air was cooler now, carrying the faint sweetness of blossoms that opened only in the evening.I sat on a low stone near the lilies, a cup of tea still warm in my hands. Aisha and Laila walked the paths, straightening ribbons, answering quiet questions, keeping an eye on the fabric. I let them work. My body felt tired but not in the way it did after a normal showing. This was a calmer kind of exhaustion, like after a long walk.The curator joined me again. He stood for a moment before lowering himself onto the stone beside me. He folded his hands over his knees, watching a silk skirt sway in the breeze.“They will remember this,” he said softly.I looked at him. “Not because of me.”“Because of how you allowed the work to exist here,” he answered. “Most designers try to fight nature. You let it in.”I wasn’t sure I deserved his words. Stil

Julian had only been back for two days when the message arrived. It came not through my assistant, not through business channels, but as a simple note slipped under the boutique door.At first I thought it was another supplier introduction or perhaps a handwritten thank-you from a customer. The envelope was plain, the handwriting unfamiliar at a glance. But when I opened it and saw the name signed at the bottom, I froze.The envelope lay flat on my desk as though it did not want to be touched again. I had already opened it, already read the words once, but even with the paper sitting still, I felt the weight of them pressing against me.Roman.It had been years since I last saw his name written in his own hand. The handwriting was sharp but slightly uneven, as if even his pen no longer carried the certainty he once had. He had written only a few sentences. A request to meet. No explanation of why. No attempt at apology on the page, not yet. Just a date, a place, and his name.I stared

The door of the café closed behind me, and with it, years of waiting closed too. I did not walk quickly at first. My steps were steady, almost deliberate, as though I was teaching my body how to move in this new air. The river was only a short walk away, and I found myself drawn there without deciding.The afternoon light hung low, scattering across the water in broken gold. Boats moved slowly along the current, their wakes dissolving into the ripples. People leaned against the railing, some with ice cream cones, others with cameras. The ordinary rhythm of strangers had never looked more extraordinary to me. Life was going on, indifferent to the small tremors in my chest.I stopped at the railing, placed both hands against the cool metal, and breathed. The conversation with Roman still pressed against me, but in a way that felt softer than I expected. It had not healed me, because I had already healed myself long before today. What it had done was place a stone in its final place, clo

The air outside the clinic felt heavy, even though it was cooler than it had been inside. I paused for a moment, closing my eyes and letting the outside world wash over me. It smelled faintly of rain and dust, and it reminded me that life kept moving even when someone else’s story reached its end.Julian was leaning against the car parked across the street. He straightened when he saw me, his expression unreadable but his eyes fixed only on me. When I reached him, he did not ask a single question, only opened the door and waited for me to step inside.The silence followed us into the car. For a while, the only sound was the hum of the engine and the faint rush of traffic beyond the window. I stared out at the lights flickering on across the city, my thoughts still caught inside that dim room with Alessia.Julian broke the silence first. “Was it what you expected?” he asked gently, his voice cautious.“No,” I said after a pause. “It was quieter than I imagined. There was no fight left

The morning after I met Claudia and Simone at the café, the air felt different. Not charged, not heavy, not even particularly calm — simply steady in a way that left me noticing the ordinary details around me. The light through the curtains was pale but unbroken, filtering across the floor in slow, softened lines. Julian was still asleep when I slipped from the bed, his breathing even, his hand stretched across the empty side as though he had tried to reach for me without waking. I stood for a moment watching him, a faint smile touching my lips before I turned quietly toward the kitchen.I brewed coffee but found I did not want it. Something else called to me, something less sharp, less hurried. I buttered a piece of bread, sat at the counter, and tried to name what had shifted since yesterday. For months I had lived in a rhythm of defense, of countering every attack, of watching Alessia’s shadow creep into places that once felt safe. Yesterday, as I sat across from Claudia and Simone