Please Forget Me - Chapter 314

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾.

Instead, I presented an officer’s identification card from the operations command, proof of both identity and income.

“Are you Johann Renner himself?”

“Yes. That’s correct.”

If I had said no, you would have waited your turn and you would have died.

That’s how I ended up pretending to be your husband.

Please believe me. I didn’t start out with bad intentions. I wasn’t trying to deceive you from the beginning.

I didn’t steal you from a living Rupert. I truly believed he was dead.

I even went back once more, just in case he was still alive, planning to bring him to the hospital if I found him. But he had vanished without a trace.

I asked the rescue workers, but they had seen countless men his age carried out that day. No one remembered Rupert specifically.

I searched every hospital in Lenningen and the surrounding areas. He wasn’t anywhere.

So I had no choice but to conclude that he really was dead. That he had been loaded onto a cart with the other bodies and buried in a mass grave at the cemetery.

…I know. Your husband is alive. Even now, I don’t understand how.

But please believe me, until just a few days ago, I truly didn’t know Rupert was alive.

…You’re asking when and how I found out?

Once I finish that story, there won’t be anything you want to hear from me anymore, will there?
We’ll… end there, won’t we…?

…You’re not saying no. I suppose I should be grateful you’re not saying it’s over, either.

Dana, I know it’s shameless of me to ask you to hear me out now. After staying silent when you asked me to speak. But please. Just this once. Let me finish my story.

If this ends here, I’m afraid you’ll misunderstand me for the rest of your life.

I’ve lived my whole life being misunderstood, so I should be used to it. But I’m not. Of all people, being misunderstood by you hurts the most.

So please. This is my final request.

…Thank you.

After that, I stayed by your side while you lay unconscious.

“I’m truly sorry for leaving you alone.”

“No, Mr. Miller. Just staying behind to help us like this puts me in your debt for life.”

Thankfully, Miller didn’t withdraw immediately. He stayed until just before the New Year to help us. He was also the one who secured part of the money for the hospital bills and Johann Renner’s forged discharge papers.

Still, I couldn’t ask him to wait until you woke up. The window for returning home was closing by the hour.

“Please make it back safely. I pray that the Marchioness may return with you. But if that proves impossible, at least you must return, Father.”

I didn’t want to imagine returning alone. Still, at that point, all I could think about was going home. I entrusted Miller with a letter to my brother and made him a promise.

“I will return. One day, without fail.”

And so I remained alone in enemy territory, staying behind to protect you.

Christmas passed before I even realized it. The New Year came and still, you didn’t wake.

Even lying there as if dead, your fingernails kept growing. I spent New Year’s night trimming your nails, crying the whole time.

Looking back, it was only two weeks. But it felt endless then. Like crawling through a tunnel with no visible end, not knowing where it would lead.

Compared to watching death approach you so helplessly, every sense of powerlessness I’d ever felt before was nothing. I realized that all my past despair had been nothing more than spoiled complaints in the face of this overwhelming dread.

“God… even if this woman is my enemy’s wife, even if she doesn’t love me—no, even if she hates me—please, let her live.”

Prayer was the only thing I could do. And even as I prayed, I feared God would find it presumptuous. After all, I once begged to die, and now I was begging for you to live.

“If you spare her life, if you let her return home safely, I swear I will repent my doubt and irreverence and live the rest of my life as a faithful servant of God.”

It was an arrogant prayer. It was more a bargain than a prayer. Whenever it came to you, I was always blind to everything else.

I, a priest who didn’t truly believe, became a fanatic because of you.

One day, when even the doctor told me to prepare myself, you opened your eyes and looked at me.

In that moment, I felt the presence of God—through you.

“…Dan… Rize?”

You regained consciousness while I had briefly stepped away. I entered the room, praying only that your bed wouldn’t be empty. There you were, sitting upright, staring straight at me, when you had always been lying still before.

I was so happy I nearly dropped to my knees to thank God right there. It felt like I was soaring again.

But then fear surged up and grabbed my elation by the ankle.

What if you had spoken the Falkland language to the doctors and nurses?