“I don’t want to eat.”
Anette protested, but Heiner cleared the empty papers atop the side table without reply.
“I said I don’t want to eat.”
“Are you trying to starve yourself to death?”
“What does it matter to you whether I starve to death or not?”
“If you mean to die, then please do so in a more elegant manner.”
Heiner turned from the cleared side table and looked at her coldly.
“You are the Princess of Rosenberg, after all.”
In that instant, Anette’s expression stiffened rigidly. She pressed her lips tight and lowered her eyes. At that wounded expression, Heiner felt filthy despite having been the one to mock her.
The Princess of Rosenberg. In the past, people had called Anette that.
Anette had been a lady admired by every man in the capital. She was the only daughter of the proud House of Rosenberg, possessed of beautiful looks and a kind heart, and even a promising pianist.
No one could treat her carelessly. Anette was someone whose nobility could be felt simply by looking at her.
To call her by that title now was nothing short of mockery.
As they were enveloped in an uncomfortable silence, a servant entered carrying food. Heiner had it placed on the table before speaking.
“Eat.”
“Leave. I’ll eat on my own.”
“And then send it away untouched, just like before?”
“If I do, what are you going to do about it?”
Anette spoke in a sharp tone. Heiner’s eyes widened slightly.
“…That’s not like you.”
“What is ‘like me’? How much do you even know about me?”
Having said that, Anette let out a scoff. This, too, was unlike her.
Since coming to know her, Heiner had never once heard Anette use such a derisive tone. Even when angry, she had expressed her rage honestly.
Even when she learned of his deliberate advances and demanded a divorce, she had been a woman who remained calm and fragile.
But now she looked considerably on edge.
*Could it be because I took her medicine?*
What on earth was that medicine? Heiner reined in his taut nerves and spoke in an even voice.
“At the very least, I know more about you than you know about me.”
“Of course. You had to know me in order to put on an act to win my heart.”
At her words, Heiner momentarily questioned himself.
“But Heiner.”
Am I still inside your heart?
“Nothing is the same as it was back then.”
Do you still love me?
“Everything has changed.”
Why do I want to ask such things?
“I am no longer the ‘Princess of Rosenberg,’ nor your lover, nor so young and innocent to the world. The me you knew and the me now are completely different people.”
“…Well, I wouldn’t know.”
“Then it’s time you learned.”
Heiner looked down at her with a blank face. He truly did not know. Anette’s words were certainly correct. She was nothing now.
That proud lineage had become scrap paper, the abundant love she once received had vanished, and she could no longer play the piano she loved. She was nothing now. And yet, why…….
Heiner moved his lips silently.
But why.
Why are you still so beautiful and noble,
and why must I still feel this sort of inferiority and wretchedness whenever I stand before you?
He truly did not know.
“…Please eat your meal. Before I have to force-feed you.”
Heiner spoke in a slightly hoarse voice and sat astride the chair opposite her. Seen up close, her features looked even more delicate.
“Hurry.”
At Heiner’s urging, Anette reluctantly began to eat her soup. She ate so quietly and slowly that not even the clink of tableware could be heard.
Heiner observed her with a somewhat restless expression. It was possible only because Anette did not spare him a single glance.
A small, pale face. Blue eyes and golden hair that were practically synonymous with Padanian beauty. Long lashes casting shadows beneath her eyes, and a flawless nose bridge.
She was truly just as she had been as a child. Only much more mature.
Heiner recalled the first moment he had laid eyes on Anette.
A girl like a doll.
Small white hands moving across the keyboard.
A noble appearance that made one wonder if she had truly been born beneath the same sky, breathing the same air.
Back then, how lowly and base he had felt.
Heiner forcibly erased the sentiment. With heavy, sunken eyes, he looked at the embroidery atop the table. The threads were tangled here and there.
Anette, who had been slowly stirring her soup, suddenly opened her mouth.
“I want to go somewhere alone for a while. Somewhat far away.”
“Alone? Where do you mean?”
“I haven’t decided yet, but anywhere…….”
“Did you think I would grant such a request? How would I know where you are going?”
“Come to think of it.”
The spoon that had been circling the soup stopped.
“Since when did I have to ask your permission for every little thing?”
Her lowered eyes were not looking at him. She muttered quietly.
“I understand what you think.”
With that, Anette asked nothing more. Heiner also closed his mouth. Silence fell between them once again.
She, who had been forcing down the food, barely emptied a third before setting down her spoon.
“I can’t eat anymore.”
“Even someone who had starved for days would eat better than that.”
“How could it go down with you watching me like that? I feel like I’ll choke.”
Heiner let out a low sigh and stood up. His steps toward the door momentarily halted. He turned his head slightly to look at her and spoke as if in warning.
“…If I hear you refuse a meal even one more time, I will regard it as a psychiatric eating disorder and have you admitted to a hospital.”
No answer came. Anette was looking down at her soup with an increasingly gaunt face.
Heiner clenched his fist tight, then unclenched it, and opened the door roughly.
***
Long legs strode across the room. Entering his own room, Heiner placed the pill bottle on his desk and turned the telephone dial.
Before long, the other party answered.
[Yes, this is Arnold Burkel.]
“This is Heiner Waldemar. I apologize for calling in the evening, Doctor Arnold. Might I speak with you for a moment?”
[Ah, Your Excellency. Of course, of course. What is the matter?]
“There is a pill whose name I wish to know. It was prescribed to my wife. Small, round, and white, with S, Z, and 5 written in the center.”
[S, Z……. Ah, it is Sinazel.]
“Is it a tranquilizer?”
[Yes. It is usually prescribed as a sleeping pill. It was prescribed to your wife as a sleeping pill as well.]
“…I see. Thank you. Then I shall see you next time.”
[Yes, Your Excellency. I wish you a peaceful night.]
Heiner set down the phone and breathed heavily for a while, his hand propped on the desk. A deathly silence pervaded the dark room.
In his dim vision, the pill bottle shone with a whiteness so bright it hurt the eyes. Its surface seemed to overlap with Anette’s pallid face.
Heiner snatched the pill bottle from the desk and shoved it into the trash bin.
“This is absurd.”
He muttered darkly and turned, walking toward the wardrobe. Heiner removed his gray overcoat, hung it on a hanger, and began unbuttoning his shirt one by one.
Hoarding medicine is a behavioral sign of someone contemplating death. But Heiner did not think for a moment that Anette was seriously considering suicide. It was merely a habit to comfort herself psychologically.
Anette was a timid and weak woman. One who lacked even the courage to decide upon death. That was why she trembled so at public opinion in the newspapers, or at the piano, and such things.
Drill, beatings, torture, starvation, even the sensation of killing… She was a woman who knew nothing of such things. It was only natural she felt such terrible misery over trifling matters.
Throughout unbuttoning, Heiner kept fumbling. Yet he paid it no mind. With an impassive face, he looked at the full-length mirror before him.
A man with gloomy gray eyes was trapped within the glass.
“The more I look at you, the more I think you have truly beautiful eyes.”
“My eyes? I’ve never heard that before.”
“Really? I can’t believe it, when they’re so pretty. Among your features, I like your eyes the most.”
“You don’t like the other parts?”
“Of course not! I have high standards, you know. I’d never date a man who wasn’t handsome.”
“Oh dear, I would have liked you even if you weren’t pretty.”
“That means you think I’m pretty anyway, right?”
“You are the prettiest in the world.”
Eyes brimming with love curved gently. The blue irises sank so deep within them they were almost no longer visible.
A spring breeze blew from afar. Dazzling golden hair fluttered. A bright laugh scattered like flower petals.
Where the illusion had passed, only a desolate gray wasteland remained. He closed his eyes for a long moment, then opened them. It was reality once more.
If you are unhappy, it is a welcome thing, Heiner murmured inwardly.
You must despair as much as I despaired. You must lose as much as I lost. Since you were there in my unhappy moments, I must be there in yours.
Just as my life was dark for so long, so must yours be.
Heiner removed his shirt. In the silence, only the rustling of clothes filled the room. In the mirror half-shrouded by darkness, broad shoulders and a chest tightly packed with muscle were reflected.
Across the upper part of his chest, a phrase in the common tongue was carved in a crude, messy hand. It was a brand mark, intertwined with red, scarred traces.
‘IM A RENT BOY OF PADANIA (I am a rent boy of Padania)’