The inside of the carriage was silent.
The man half-buried in darkness did not move, nor did the eyes fixed on the passing streets outside. Only now and then, when pale smoke slipped past the lips holding a pipe, did the darkness grow thicker. The sound of hooves and wheels rolling over stone pavement echoed through the quiet residential streets.
Edmund sat with his gaze cast aimlessly outside, as though he’d tossed it somewhere beyond the carriage like a fishing line. And inevitably, his thoughts drifted back to Rose—the Rose he’d run into earlier at Chairman Harrison’s house.
His fiancée, whom he’d met again after four years.
Four years ago, after leaving Islesford, he’d waited for her for about two years.
Even while resenting her, even while feeling wronged, every morning he’d check the mail first thing upon waking. Ridiculous as it was, he really had.
Yet during all the time he spent in Queensland, Rose never sent him a single letter.
There were moments when Edmund had nearly written to her first—out of lingering affection, or out of anxiety that she might have forgotten him. Just as he had waited and waited, then finally gone to see her himself on the night before she left Islesford.
But even when he poured his heart into letter after letter late into the night, the sight of an empty mailbox the next morning always left him disappointed and wounded in pride. And so he’d throw away the letter he’d written all night, straight into the trash.
Just like that night—when he’d turned away in anger after seeing Rose spend tender time with Noel instead of coming to him, right up until the very last evening.
Waiting led to anger, anger to resignation. He finally escaped that tiresome cycle two years ago, after returning from Queensland when his studies there ended.
It was vacation season, so Rose must have known he was back. And yet, claiming she was traveling with friends, she never once came to Islesford. Watching that, Edmund finally realized it.
She had forgotten him.
And he no longer needed to wait for her either.
From then on, he tried hard to forget her. The fierce emotions of his youth slowly oxidized and faded away, and he himself grew too old to remain stuck in such childish feelings.
All that remained in his heart was white ash—no longer capable of igniting.
But he realized that those ashes were not disappointment or resignation after all. They were longing.
And he understood that only after running into Rose that afternoon in Portnum Square.
Her rose-colored hair and pale green eyes stirred the part of his heart where she had still been living, breathing. The moment he saw her innocent smile, the memories he’d buried bloomed back to life like flowers.
He drifted on those tender emotions for half a day.
Until he ran into her again at Chairman Harrison’s house.
‘It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Shore.’
Reaching the end of that long recollection, Edmund let out a hollow laugh.
Nice to meet you, Mr. Shore?
Fine—let’s say she’d pretended not to know him because she was flustered. Even granting her that much, there were plenty of other things that grated on him.
The fact that she’d been dancing with another man before he arrived.
Her immodest clothing.
The faint scent of alcohol that drifted from her every time she opened her mouth.
And that wasn’t all. When she followed him outside afterward, she hadn’t even asked how he’d been. She talked only about herself—never once wondering how he’d lived all this time, concerned solely with her own safety.
As he recalled it all, the smooth line of his brow twisted. Like his warped mood, the cigarette clenched between his lips bent crookedly as well.
Both Rose herself and her actions—everything that had evaporated his tender longing in the span of half a day—were utterly displeasing.
But when he looked back on the past, none of this was really new.
Rose Panning had always been a bundle of things he didn’t like.
Should he praise her for being consistent, at least?
Drunken shouting rang loudly through the late-night streets, grating on his nerves. His jaw tightened around the cigarette. Edmund exhaled smoke like a sigh.
__________𓍯𓂃𓏧♡𓇢𓆸_________
The harbor city suffered every winter under fierce sea winds, but when the seasons changed, the sea was always the first to soften and welcome spring.
The spirits of spring that had traveled south to survive the winter returned one by one, chirping overhead, and the trees lining the streets—still thin—held tiny buds on their branches.
Late in the afternoon, Rose headed toward Portnum along a park road thickly carpeted with fallen leaves. She’d left earlier than her friends to stop by the grocer and buy something for dinner.
Because Walsingham University’s main gate was nearby, students she recognized spotted her along the way and tipped their hats in greeting. With some, she exchanged light pleasantries.
Rose always felt good walking through the university district. The sense of belonging—of standing among the people she’d admired since childhood—always brought her a fresh thrill.
But even this time will end after this year, won’t it?
Perhaps because she’d met Edmund yesterday, the reality that marriage was right around the corner suddenly felt all too real. The brightness in her face, lifted by the spring sunlight, dimmed in an instant.
Once Rose completed her graduation ceremony this spring, both families would immediately shackle the two of them with marriage. It was something promised fifteen years ago.
A sigh slipped from her lips.
I’m not dreaming of calling off the marriage. I just wish I could delay it a little.
Putting aside her regret at the end of her freedom, there was at least one thing she couldn’t do—she couldn’t marry this spring.
That reason was tied directly to the fact that she wouldn’t be able to attend her graduation ceremony scheduled for this spring…
Just as she was thinking that, a passing carriage suddenly stopped in the middle of the road. She looked over in surprise and locked eyes with a familiar man.
Edmund.
Before she could fully recover from the shock of the encounter, Edmund leaned out from beyond the carriage door and asked,
“I’m genuinely curious—are you actually a student?”
Considering he’d only seen her roaming around outside since yesterday, it was a fair question.
If Rose had been an ordinary student, she might have felt a pang of guilt. But she hadn’t come to the university to study in the first place. Calming herself, she answered boldly.
“I’m currently allowed to be out under the dean’s permission.”
“Sounds like the dean even approved staying out late to party.”
Edmund released the latch on the carriage door, shoved it open without much care, and said,
“Get in.”
The sarcasm irritated her, but Rose didn’t refuse. After all, she had something to say to Edmund as well.
Still, contrary to her resolve to settle everything they hadn’t finished yesterday, once she was seated across from him, she found it hard to open her mouth.
It was because Edmund had been staring at her in silence all this time.
Sitting with one leg crossed, his gaze pressed down on her so insistently it felt oppressive. Crushed by it, Rose couldn’t bring herself to meet his eyes; at best, her gaze crept only as far as the neatly knotted tie at his throat.
Looking at him now, Edmund was nothing like he’d been four years ago. He was fully a man.
His neck was thicker, his shoulders broad, and even through his jacket she could sense the solid muscles of his arms and body, radiating a powerful masculinity.
Suddenly, Rose felt hot. Tension wrapped around her shoulders and the back of her neck, and being conscious of his gaze made it hard to breathe. Being alone with him like this felt more uncomfortable than ever before.
To break the silence that only worsened her unease, she felt she had to speak first.
Bringing up the main issue right away felt awkward, so she searched for something else to say—and remembered a question she hadn’t had the chance to ask yesterday.
Once she found her words, her tension eased.
Rose lifted her head and asked,
“Have you been well?”
Edmund stared at her with unreadable eyes before answering,
“I’ve been fine. You….”
Naturally, she thought he was about to ask about her. But she was wrong.
“You seemed to be doing pretty well yourself, judging by yesterday.”
His tone veered off just as things were going smoothly. Rose made a bitter face, but as someone with a favor to ask, she didn’t show her displeasure.
“Well, about what we talked about yesterday—”
Before she could even finish starting, Edmund cut her off, as if he’d already guessed her intent.
“You’re going to ask me to keep it secret, right? Sorry, but I’m on Uncle George’s side. If it were my daughter, and I saw her go off to university ‘to study’ only to wander around late at night in an immodest outfit, hanging out with some guy, I’d drag her straight back home.”
The rapid barrage of words could have left anyone reeling. But Rose carefully retraced them one by one and responded calmly.
“I was already planning to stop staying out so late. And as for the immodest outfit—my dress hem caught fire in the fireplace and burned horribly, so Mrs. Harrison lent me that one. It wasn’t even my dress to begin with. And as for ‘some guy’… you don’t mean Anthony, do you?”
Edmund didn’t answer. He simply glared at her with a displeased expression. A sigh escaped Rose at the baseless suspicion.
“Anthony is just a friend.”
“Do you think everyone else—including that guy—sees it that way?”
“Of course. Anthony already has someone he cares about. And not just Anthony—everyone knows I have a fiancé.”
“Everyone knows you have a fiancé? Then why did you pretend not to know me in front of them yesterday?”
Ah, that. Rose added that she’d been planning to explain anyway.
“You know how famous Uncle Carl is here. I didn’t want attention by telling the truth. I just wanted to enjoy a normal school life.”
Facing Edmund’s still-skeptical gaze, Rose spread her hands as if presenting her innocence. With nothing to feel guilty about, she met his probing stare head-on.
Edmund studied her as though trying to peel her apart layer by layer. Then, perhaps moved by her confidence, the sharpness in his eyes slowly softened.
“So the misunderstanding’s cleared up now, right? You’ll keep it a secret?”
But instead of agreeing, Edmund turned his head away as if playing dumb.
“I’ll see how you behave.”
“What?”
Rose’s brow furrowed. Even after she’d explained everything, he still acted like he held leverage over her, and irritation began to bubble up.
At last, a scolding tone slipped from her lips.
“It’s not right to act superior just because you’ve got one weakness on someone. You know that, right?”
“Don’t know,” he said shamelessly.
Rose rubbed her temples at the sight of him.
“Then don’t you want to learn, starting now?”
“Do I look like it?”
His mood had noticeably lightened, and he even flashed her a grin.
His infuriating expression made her boil inside, but Rose only pressed her lips together. What was there to say to someone so determined not to be persuaded?
“Fine. Do whatever you want.”
Rose decided she wouldn’t say another word to Edmund. She held back her anger, and when the carriage entered a busy district, she said stiffly,
“I’d like to get off here.”
But Edmund replied with something completely unexpected.
“Let’s go eat.”
“I already ate.”
“Then watch me eat.”
The carriage stopped in front of a restaurant. Edmund opened the door, stepped down, and said,
“Aren’t you getting out?”
He was utterly self-willed. Rose stared at him, utterly dumbfounded.
