One Sided Conversations

The face of Rosina, as he walked over and looked down at her, was motionless.
She, who was not awake, looked peaceful, yet she frowned from time to time as if having a bad dream.
“Did you say the seizures have decreased a lot?”
Theron asked the nurse.
The nurse smiled.
“Yes. Her physical condition has also improved a lot. If she maintains this state, she might open her eyes someday.”
‘Opening her eyes.’
That meant she would wake up from a long sleep.
Theron wondered if that would be a good thing for his mother.
The conclusion was negative, without needing to think too far.
Because life was something she wouldn’t regret ending at any time.
It was a truly unremarkable life.
She had lived her whole life in poverty, and whenever she got a little money, her husband would spend it all on alcohol and drugs, and on top of that, he would get drunk and become violent.
She, who suffered from severe depression, would lock herself in her room and cry every day.
If she was going to live so miserably, she shouldn’t have had a child, but she gave birth to a young son she couldn’t take responsibility for and neglected him.
Theron, who had to spend his childhood thrown into that hell and had become another victim, naturally did not feel any sympathy for her.
Theron remembered that desperate hunger and misery.
Starving was a daily routine, and it was a beast-like life where he didn’t even know what was wrong with stealing bread from a street stall.
Poverty made people like that.
Anxious and desperate.
Not only that, but it also took away the dignity and agape love of family that are naturally given to humans.
That’s why Theron hated his mother.
That woman who just watched him with tears in her eyes when he was starving and being kicked by his father.
She probably didn’t know.
That what was growing in her young son was not just the bruises on his face, but also the bruises in his heart.
The only time she, who had thoroughly played the role of a bystander, had stood up for her son was just once.

“Theron, run away!”

That day, as if her seizure had acted up, she had struck her husband’s head, who was trying to drown him in the bathtub.
She had run out of the house with the single act of courage her mother had never shown before. Was that perhaps the only mercy of God, who had pitied him?
‘No, if it were mercy, he wouldn’t have played such a prank.’
Theron’s eyes towards Rosina sank darkly.
He had hoped that his connection with his parents would be completely severed when he ran away from home, but that wish was only half-fulfilled.
About a year after he started working at the pub, he heard that his trash-like father had died on the street in the cold winter, drunk and wandering around.
He couldn’t hear any news about his mother, but since there was no news of her death, he had thought she was living well somewhere, somehow.
The reunion with her was a very damn coincidence.
Five years ago, the busiest street in the capital of Cantora was not as well-maintained as it is now, and because the roads were often congested, drivers would step on the pedals carelessly.
Theron, who was crossing the road, was unlucky enough to encounter a driver who had thrown the rule of law to the dogs.
Flash.
Theron still remembered that moment vividly.
A car spewing dazzling light approached at high speed.
As he foresaw that he would be hit by that lump of iron, his crappy life until now passed by like a revolving lantern.
Memories of being beaten by the bastard he didn’t even want to call his father, memories of placing his hand on the cold piano keys for the first time, memories of borrowing money from the bank to start his own business, such good and bad memories.
However, the front bumper of the rushing car did not reach Theron.
Because Rosina, whom he didn’t even know was nearby, had suddenly jumped out, pushed Theron away, and was hit instead.
Drip, drip.
A pool of blood had formed at his feet.
It was the blood that had flowed from between Rosina’s messy hair.
Theron, who had assessed the situation, rushed her to the hospital, but Rosina did not wake up, and she had remained in this corpse-like state in the hospital ever since.
‘Why.’
Theron was tormented by numerous thoughts after that.
Why she was near him at that particular time, why the woman who had stood by when her husband hit her had thrown herself at the car, what she had expected from him after hearing he had started a business, or if she had taken out a large insurance policy.
Dirty questions followed one after another.
Thinking about it now, it was probably a sense of debt.
Even while dismissing her sacrifice as something he hadn’t wanted, the image of her being hit by a car in his place would flicker in his mind when he closed his eyes.
If it had just flickered like a ghost, it wouldn’t have been so torturous, but as time passed, Theron’s anxiety and insomnia worsened, and he would often spend his days in a daze.
It felt as if her soul was wandering around and tormenting him, resentful that she had become like that after throwing her body for him.
Theron foresaw that this symptom would not be temporary.
If he didn’t find a way, he would forever be tormented by this guilt and sense of debt and live his life in a muddle.
Theron, who had stayed in the hospital room for several days, watching the corpse-like Rosina, had come to a conclusion.
That he had to repay her for his life.
Then the memory of that day, deeply engraved in his mind and tormenting him, would also disappear.
For that, it couldn’t be just a moderate amount.
He had to repay a large sum of money, enough to feel that he had done his part.
But at the same time, he wondered if it was meaningful, because Rosina had become a vegetable after the accident, and she couldn’t use the money even if he gave it to her.
Theron, who had been thinking deeply, recalled what his mother used to say like a habit in his childhood.

“Theron, your maternal grandfather was a very rich man when he was young. He had a large vineyard on the Rigus Coast, and the grapes you ate there in the summer were so delicious.”

Theron was young at the time, so he wanted to ask why they were often hungry if his maternal grandfather was so rich.
Nevertheless, the reason he couldn’t bring himself to ask was because her eyes, which had been sparkling as if recalling a happy memory, had quickly turned gray.
Theron only learned after he grew up.
That his maternal grandfather had indeed been the owner of that vineyard, but he had lost all his fortune through gambling and disappeared.
Setting aside the fact that there were so many pathetic people, Theron decided to repay his debt to his mother with that.
By buying the vineyard she used to talk about like a habit to her young self, transferring the ownership to her, and letting her live the rest of her life there.
It would be good if she came to her senses one day and could look around the vineyard, and even if not, her body would be there, so he would have done all he could.
It was just that the price of that already expensive land was soaring to the sky every year.
But Theron had no intention of giving up.
It wasn’t that she, in her vegetative state, was threatening him with a knife to his throat, or resenting him for what had happened, but Theron foresaw that if he gave up on this, his soul would forever be bound to this hospital room.
Nevertheless, the reason he was now looking back on whether that decision was right was probably because of that woman, Selene Ashcombe.
Because no matter what his circumstances were, the fact that he was deceiving that woman for his own sake did not change.
“I’ll leave you two alone for a while.”
The nurse spoke quietly to Theron, who was looking down at Rosina with a sunken expression.
Theron was about to say there was no need, but it was also ridiculous to stop the nurse who was already leaving, so he let her be.
Thud.
As the nurse closed the door and left, the already silent air became so heavy that it felt as if it were pressing down on his chest.
As if she had noticed the change, Rosina’s eyelids twitched slightly.
At the rare movement, Theron thought that perhaps his voice might reach her now.
‘What would it feel like to hear your son’s resentment while being unable to do anything?’
‘Would it be painful, or would you be angry?’
‘I wouldn’t care either way.’
‘In fact, it might be for the better. If my true feelings could reach that woman for even a moment.’
Theron, with a twisted smile, spat out the words that had been lingering in his chest.
“Do you know?”
“…”
“That I still hate you.”
Through Theron’s lowered eyelids, his eyes shone gloomily.
“I’ll probably hate you forever. So you should also think that you never had a son in the first place. That everything until now was just a terrible nightmare.”
“…”
“A very terrible nightmare.”
To Rosina, who couldn’t possibly be listening, Theron conveyed the words he had held onto until the end.
Twitch.
But suddenly, Rosina’s finger moved as if convulsing.
‘Did she hear…?’
Theron’s brow furrowed for a moment, but the movement soon stopped, as if the reaction had been a mere coincidence.
‘…There’s no way.’
Theron, who had calmed his startled heart, smoothed his expression.
‘It doesn’t matter if that woman hears my resentment or not.’
Even while thinking that, Theron felt the air in the hospital room to be unbearably stuffy, so he opened the door and went out.
Only Rosina, with her eyes closed, was left in the chilly hospital room.