Remember me naked のすべてのチャプター: チャプター 41 - チャプター 50

LYRAThe silence is different here.It doesn't weigh down. It doesn't accuse. It doesn't lurk, ready to rush in between two awkward silences or two withheld phrases. No. Here, it cradles. It soothes. It allows the breath to return.I arrived home before Lucas.The immense front door creaked like in my childhood memories. But it wasn't a sinister creak, rather a greeting. A familiar memory. And the smell of polished wood, mingled with that of fresh laundry, enveloped me as soon as I crossed the threshold. A living home. A beloved home.Downstairs, voices echoed. Mom was humming in the kitchen. Dad was undoubtedly chatting with her, a glass of wine in hand. They spoke softly, but I recognized them. That muffled complicity, that language of theirs that nothing had eroded.I went upstairs, my heart tight with gratitude.My room hadn’t changed. The same wallpaper faded by the sun. The same bookshelf overflowing with old novels. The same window open to the garden. A cocoon.I set down my su

CASSANDRAThe bed is cold from his absence.I feel it as soon as I reach out into the empty space beside mine. The sheets are perfectly smooth, as if he has never been there. No indentation, no warmth, no trace. Nothing.And that nothing slaps me awake.He didn’t sleep here. Not last night.I lie there, eyes open, fixed on the ceiling. A ceiling I know too well. Every crack, every stain, every shadow at dawn. This ceiling, a witness to my insomnia, my compromises, my silences. To my slow descent into this waiting that leads nowhere.I sit up, my heart already tight, my shoulders stiff.Where was he, again? In the office? On the couch? Or in that blurry space he now inhabits, a strange in-between where I am never invited?I get up. I put on a sweater, a pair of jeans. No makeup. Just a hint of composure. A layer of protection.And I go down.He is there. Obviously.In the kitchen. Calm. Perfect. Coffee in hand. Shirt open over a wrinkled t-shirt. As if he were at home. As if nothing we

CASSANDRA I hold my breath. Her words resonate, clear, terrible. Like a guillotine falling silently. — You need to find something to get rid of the child… and in the same way, Lyra. My heart pounds hard. I should hang up. Scream. Cry. But I stay there, frozen, the phone pressed against my ear like an inverted lifeline. Part of me screams not to go further. The other listens fiercely. — Help me do it. Be more explicit, mom. The silence that follows is not hesitant. It is… strategic. She measures, weighs the words she is about to speak. And then, her voice drops an octave, turning into an acid caress. — Very well. Do you want the naked truth? You will get it. She doesn’t tremble. She doesn’t shy away. She speaks as if she has seen this scene a hundred times before. And maybe she has. Maybe I am just another actress in the play she wrote for me since childhood. — If you want him to come back to you, the world around that girl must collapse. Not violently.

CASSANDRASometimes, it takes almost nothing.A glance a little too long at a blank screen.A sigh held between two words.A tension in the shoulders, imperceptible but constant.And you know.I know.I saw it in Alexandre.Something in him has changed.Since her.Not since he saw her again. Even if there was never a story, but that one… one night made him addicted. A night he cannot remember.And yet, it left a mark.Invisible, but deep.Just her name annoys me.It sounds like a spell.Like a word whispered so as not to forget it, even when you don’t understand why you keep it in your mouth.And Alexandre, he kept it.Not in his arms, in his head, in his heart.And that’s worse.I’m not jealous.That would be too simple.I’m… perplexed.Worried, maybe.Irritated, surely.Because she succeeded, effortlessly, where others took months.She cracked something in him.And she did it… without doing anything.No promises. No story. Not even a real memory.Just a presence.And that is enough

LYRAThere are days when the universe seems to align with you, not to console you, but to offer you the luxury of feeling in control. An illusion, no doubt. But a well-dressed illusion.The sky is pale, washed in light, and even the city seems to move in slow motion, as if holding its breath. My coffee is at the perfect temperature, the exact taste I was expecting. And my black dress, modestly slit, moves with my gestures as if it knew before I did what this day demands.I am neither light nor euphoric.But I am upright, grounded, and present.Lucas is waiting for me in front of the building, leaning against his car, sunglasses on his nose, the collar of his shirt slightly open. He radiates that nonchalant, almost annoying confidence that comes from years of reading others like a half-open book.— Two minutes late, I note, he says, without moving an inch.— You must have suffered; two minutes is long for your ego.He flashes me a sideways smile. It’s our language: a mix of sharpness a