Chapter 16
It was a little embarrassing to bring up my birthday myself, but my older brother came in at just the right timing. I straightened my shoulders more confidently than ever and nodded.
“Birthday? It’s your birthday?”
“Yeah, it’s my birthday! So I wanted to invite you guys, but it’s kind of…”
“Invite us? Does that even make sense?!”
As if he’d noticed my hesitation first, the younger twin snapped irritably.
Normally, I would’ve snapped back, asking why he was so annoyed, but not anymore.
“Yeah. It wouldn’t be right for us to go.”
“Let’s go together next time, to the next party.”
When my brother said that, I felt something heavy in my chest. So I reached my hands out to them.
“Hook your pinkies and promise.”
Of course, they didn’t seem to understand what I was doing, but I stubbornly hooked both of their little fingers with mine.
“This is how you promise. And a pinky promise is something you absolutely must never forget.”
“What are we even promising.”
The younger twin roughly wiped his nose and stuck out his lips.
“You have to come to my birthday party later. So till then, practice dancing properly. When you come to my party, I’m going to choose my partner between the one who dances better.”
“Dance?”
“Yeah. You have to dance at parties.”
“Wow, I’m really looking forward to it. I’ll practice hard.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. As if you get to decide. That’s up to us.”
Seeing how much more confident they were than before made something stir strangely in my chest. It was happy yet sad. I was glad their original personalities were finally showing, and at the same time, I couldn’t help wondering why kids like them had to grow up so guarded, hiding their feelings.
‘Though honestly, I’m ridiculous for thinking this. In the past I was the one bullying them the most.’
It wasn’t really my place to say anything, but pitiful things are still pitiful.
Back then, I was… too young, too thoughtless, too foolish. I wonder if I can be forgiven for the guilt I feel even now. It’s probably selfish, but still, in this life I want to do my absolute best for them.
“So how long do we have to keep shaking our hands like this?”
While I was lost in thought, absentmindedly shaking our joined hands up and down, a grumbling voice snapped me back.
“Ah.”
The one who stopped first was my brother, looking more uncomfortable with the situation than anything.
Though he sounded annoyed, the younger twin was still diligently moving his hand up and down along with mine.
“Oh, sorry. It’s done now.”
“Do promises always take this long?”
“Uh… well. Yeah. Kind of.”
I just nodded vaguely, afraid he’d complain more if I said no.
Then embarrassment suddenly washed over me, so I hurried past the twins and went to the window.
“Oh. Come to think of it, the weather’s really nice today.”
A moment later, the twins also came to my side and looked out. There wasn’t much else to talk about.
The weather really was great, the sky unusually high. The slowly drifting clouds somehow calmed my heart.
And seeing how preparations were already underway for my birthday tomorrow made my heart even heavier.
It was definitely supposed to be a happy day. I should’ve felt excited, but my heart felt strange.
‘Will I really be able to do well this time?’
I’d acted confident in front of Grandma, and I’d tried hard to express myself in front of her sons and grandchildren, but honestly, I was scared too.
Scared I might die again. Scared that impossible death I’d already experienced once might happen again.
‘If the twins don’t hate me… would everything really be okay? Then Dad won’t die, I won’t die… and we can just live this life?’
As I kept thinking like that, something heavy settled in my chest.
Just then, a sudden gust of wind blew in through the window. Maybe because of the cold air, my eyes suddenly stung.
As if trying to protect them, tears welled up—and maybe because my heart was so weighed down, once they started, they wouldn’t stop.
I thought I’d been enduring bravely, but I guess I was more tired and lonely than I’d realized. Well, it’d be stranger if a kid went through so much and was completely fine.
Afraid someone might see, I quickly wiped my tears, but the younger twin took the chance to stick his face right into mine.
“Why are you crying?”
“Are you really crying?”
The day I came back from the main house always left me oddly depressed.
It wasn’t because of how I was treated. I just hated seeing Dad sad because of me. Whenever I thought of him, all I felt was sorry. Sorry for not being able to protect him, and scared I wouldn’t be able to again.
‘Why am I crying…’
I hadn’t expected to cry here, so my lips stuck out in embarrassment.
I didn’t cry in front of Dad, so why am I crying here? So embarrassing.
“I’m not crying.”
“You are. Your eyes are red.”
“I said I’m not!”
“I’m pretty sure I saw tears pooling in your eyes.”
“N-no, I didn’t! Ahem.”
Not wanting to show them I cried, I hurried away from the window and busied myself looking around the room even more deliberately.
Then suddenly, a poorly placed sheet of paper in the corner caught my eye.
“What’s this?”
I peered at it curiously, and the younger twin quickly blocked me.
“H-hey, don’t look!”
It was even worse than the picture I’d drawn…
“A map?”
“I-it’s not a map!”
“Then what is it? This would be where we are right now, and this looks like that path… even if you deny it, it’s totally a map. A really badly drawn one though.”
The younger twin’s face flushed red and pale in turns.
“So you drew this map, huh?”
“No, I didn’t! I drew it!”
“So it IS a map?”
“N-no, that’s not—”
He’d been answering quickly before but now he just pouted, like he wanted to fight back but couldn’t. His feelings were written all over his face.
“So you must’ve been sneaking out at night to draw this, huh? Planning to run away?”
Originally, the twins tried to run away and failed. Knowing that, I asked—but their reactions were calmer than expected.
“So what if we were. You gonna report us?”
“Stop. There’s no need to talk about it anymore.”
My usually mild, reasonable older twin suddenly spoke coldly, completely out of his normal character.
His face hardened sharply, like he was bristling with thorns. It was natural—even if he’d loosened up a lot compared to before, he still hadn’t given me his full trust yet.
‘I already knew this situation was coming.’
Everything up till now was practically for this moment.
The twins who would try to use the chaos during my birthday to escape—and fail. That was when I definitely learned that they wanted to run away from here. So I prepared for this.
“Isn’t that what you want?”
“Enough. If you’re going to say things like that, I’d rather you leave.”
Hearing my brother, who never said harsh things, speak like that made it clear just how angry he was.
“Wait. I came because I wanted to give you something first.”
Before I could really get kicked out, I fidgeted and pulled out a sheet of paper I’d been keeping hidden.
“This.”
“That’s enough for today.”
My brother tried to stop him, but the younger twin snatched the paper from my hands.
“What is this?”
“A map. A real map.”
When I said “a real map,” even my brother—who’d been rejecting everything—leaned in close.
“What? A real map?”
And when they unfolded it, what they saw was the best map I could manage of this building.
It was admittedly kind of pathetic though, so the younger twin immediately snorted when he saw it.
“You drew this?”
“Yeah. Why? What about it!”
Feeling a little attacked, I purposely raised my voice defensively.
“You’re not really in any position to laugh at anyone else’s drawing.”
“That’s not true! Mine’s way better!”
Well… maybe just a tiny bit. Not much. I wanted to argue that, but honestly they were about the same. Still, I couldn’t back down, so I quickly shifted their attention back to the map.
“Anyway, this really is a real map. I even marked all the hidden passageways I’ve learned about living here.”
Counting my past life, I’ve lived here for over ten years. There’s no other map more accurate than this.
But as the twins checked the map, their expressions slowly turned strange.
