Two people sat on a large bed, leaning against the headboard and staring at the opposite wall. Even though they were on the same bed, there was a clear separation between them, neither willing to bridge the gap.
The reason for their posture was simple. They couldn’t bear to face each other while saying the things they wanted to say.
Elena fidgeted restlessly. When Damien said he wanted to have this conversation over a month ago, she was already nervous. She knew as well as he did how twisted their relationship had become.
They started off as simple childhood friends. They had a bond that not even the strongest God could break. When Elena thought about this bond…
She wondered whether falling in love with Damien was ever the right decision.
Maybe it was because of her love that their relationship became so twisted. If she never desired progress in their relationship after Damien already had Rose, she wouldn’t be feeling the ugly feelings in her heart right now.
It was hard to suppress these thoughts. And because of the lack of contact from Damien, her thoughts only became wilder with every passing day.
“…I hated you.” Damien finally opened his mouth and spoke. His voice was so low it was almost inaudible.
But the words he said made Elena’s heart jump. An indescribable pain filled her heart, almost disallowing her from hearing the rest of his words.
But Damien didn’t leave her waiting for long. He knew his words could be easily misinterpreted, and he wanted no more misunderstandings between them.
“It was an unreasonable hatred, and it was concealed so deep I didn’t even notice it until a few months ago. From the start, the reason our relationship became so twisted is my fault.”
Damien’s gaze never left the wall, but he could practically feel Elena’s nervousness. Yet, he didn’t look over. He didn’t know if he could say what he wanted to say if he looked over.
“Before I fell, I ignored your feelings. It wasn’t that I didn’t know how you felt, it was that I thought of your feelings as another burden for me to carry.” Damien sighed.
“I’ve tried to justify my thought process from back then many times. I’ve tried to say it was inevitable for me to act like that since I had so much on my plate. I tried to say that I was simply prioritizing survival over anything else.
“…but that was always just me trying to absolve myself of blame.”
The room was quiet. Even the sounds of crickets chirping in the nighttime outside were muted. But the cool moonlight still illuminated the area, giving something for Damien’s eyes to follow as he spoke the words he hid in his heart for so long.
“I didn’t love you back then. I won’t lie to you and say that I did. Before my fall, I never thought of you as anything more than a childhood friend. And because I was afraid of our relationship crumbling if I ever acknowledged your feelings, I ignored them.
“I was simply being selfish. I didn’t want to lose the only support pillar I had remaining in my dreary life. To the me back then, you became an object of dependence rather than a human being. It was a really cruel way to treat you, and the only thing I can do about it now is apologize.
“However, I don’t think it’s something I should be forgiven for. The attitude I held back then was the beginning of our twisted relationship.”
Damien closed his eyes. These were feelings of long ago and feelings that didn’t affect him much in the present. When compared to the other things he needed to say, this was the easiest.
Yet, he was still having so much trouble.
Elena, on the other hand, was trying her best to not break out into tears. To describe her current emotions in one word, she was heartbroken.
It was hard. How was she supposed to simply take in Damien’s past perspective without feeling anything? Even if emotions of the past didn’t have any say in their current relationship, did that mean it wouldn’t hurt?
It wasn’t just the rejection that hurt. Damien practically said that he used to view her as a “tool” he could use to keep himself supported. Would any sane person be able to accept that?
She felt betrayed.
But she held on and continued listening. Even if his words hurt, they were words she needed to hear. It was a side of the story she needed to know if their current relationship was to progress at all.
Damien knew this too, and that was why he poured out all the negative feelings he hid without reservation.
“Perhaps it was because of how I used to view you that hatred was born in my heart. When I was thrown into the dungeon, the target of my unreasonable blame was you.
“The little immature shit I used to be felt betrayed by his support pillar. The fact that he was left alone in an unknown world whittled away at his sanity, further fueling that hatred. Since he had to put his everything into surviving, he slowly forgot about this hatred.
“But it didn’t disappear.”
Damien sighed again. He couldn’t stop himself from sighing during this conversation. In the end, he told Elena about everything he saw in the Trial of Self.
The raw emotions of a broken Damien, the result of his insanity, the irrationality of everything he did, he let Elena know it all.
Not for forgiveness, not for pity, not for justification. He told her only so she could understand another root of the problem.
“…after that, I met Rose. Rose was the one who pulled me out of the trench of insanity, she was the one who saved me from the personal hell I forged for myself. That might be the reason why I fell in love with her in the first place. Another case of pathetic dependence.
“It’s a miracle that my relationship with Rose didn’t turn out to be toxic as well, but that’s most likely because I put conscious effort into preventing that development. Since Rose was beside me all the time, I was able to do that.
“But it was different for you. Because most of the development between us happened when we were apart, I allowed our relationship to continue twisting without even realizing it was happening.”
For the first time, Damien looked over at Elena. Her face was already stained with tears, but her expression was cold. He didn’t like the disconnect, but he couldn’t do anything about it.
It was his fault.
“Have I ever told you about the illusion trial I went through in Apeiron?” He suddenly asked.
Not waiting for an answer, he continued speaking. He talked about the life he saw, the “what if” that would never come to be.
“In that life, our relationship was able to develop without all the complications we experienced in reality. It was really a heartwarming scene. And it was that scene that dispelled the built-up hatred I had and planted a seed of interest in my heart.
“This is where we get to the second change.”
“Stop.” Elena interrupted before Damien could continue to speak.
Looking at him coldly, she finally began voicing her thoughts.