༺ Chapter 233 - The Struggles of a Fiancée (12) ༻
Warm hands slipped over Soren’s eyes from behind the bench, fingers soft against his brow, and a familiar voice sang right into his ear.
“Guess who?~”
Soren didn’t flinch, mostly because the day had already wrung the jumpiness out of him, and because the hands were too light to be a threat.
He let out a slow breath through his nose instead, the kind that carried both tiredness and resignation.
“Soone who enjoys harassnt,” he replied.
Esper’s fingers tightened for half a second, as if she were pretending to strangle him, then she leaned closer, her perfu and the faint sweetness of whatever she had eaten clinging to her like a second outfit.
“Wrong,” she said brightly. “It’s your beloved fiancée.”
Soren’s eyes narrowed under her palm.
“We’re not doing this.”
“We’re always doing this,” Esper corrected, then finally lifted her hands away.
Light hit his eyes again, and he blinked once, gaze catching her reflection in the shop window across the street before he looked up properly.
She stood behind the bench with the sa immaculate posture she always managed, even when she claid she was just being casual, makeup perfect, hair tidy, that bold outfit still loud enough to draw attention without her even trying.
Yet sothing about her looked a shade less sharp around the edges.
Not undone.
Not unguarded.
Just… quieter.
Soren pushed himself up from the bench with a small exhale, shoulders loosening as he stood.
“You finished tidying your makeup?”
Esper’s smile stayed in place, but it didn’t flash quite as brightly.
“Mm. Took longer than I wanted.”
He glanced at her, then at the flow of the crowd, making sure there wasn’t anything pressing around them.
There wasn’t.
The street was busy, but not chaotic, the kind of bustle that let people blend in if they didn’t make a scene, and Esper could blend in only in the sense that a torch could blend into a dark room.
Soren nodded once.
“Alright.”
Esper fell into step beside him without linking arms this ti, hands tucked loosely behind her back as if she were trying sothing different on purpose.
They walked at a slower pace than before, no sudden tugging, no darting between stalls, just moving through the street with the kind of tired rhythm people had at the end of a day they hadn’t expected to be long.
For a while, neither of them spoke.
It wasn’t awkward.
It was simply quiet, the sort of quiet that didn’t need patching up with jokes.
Soren found himself listening to the street instead, rchants calling out prices, the faint scrape of a cart wheel, a child complaining about wanting a sweet, and behind it all, the steady hum of life that didn’t care who was engaged to whom.
Esper’s gaze drifted from shop to shop without stopping, less like she was searching and more like she was letting her eyes rest on sothing other than thoughts.
After a few minutes, she spoke, and her voice was still light, but it didn’t have the usual bite.
“So, how do you rate my date planning?” she asked, looking ahead.
Soren’s mouth twitched, not quite a smile, more the start of one that he didn’t let fully form.
“Too long and tedious.”
Esper humd.
“Rude.”
“You asked,” he replied, then added, because he knew she would complain if he left it there, “it wasn’t terrible, though.”
Esper’s head turned slightly, eyes narrowing as if she was trying to decide whether that counted as praise.
“That’s the nicest thing you’ve said all day.”
“That’s not true.”
“It is,” she insisted, and the insistence sounded less like teasing and more like she was filing it away, as if she had a list in her head for monts that mattered.
Soren glanced sideways at her, studying her face, and he could see the mask, because she always wore one, but it sat differently now, less like armour, more like a coat she had shrugged into out of habit because the air was cold.
He didn’t comnt on it.
Comnting would make her react, and he didn’t want to make her react.
Esper slowed slightly when they passed a stall selling an assortnt of sweets, her eyes lingering on the glass jars for a second, then she kept walking without buying anything.
That alone told him she was tired, because Esper usually collected snacks as if it was her job.
A few more steps, then she spoke again, quieter this ti, her gaze still forward.
“Thanks,” she said.
Soren blinked once.
“For what?”
Esper’s lips pressed together, the smile staying, but thinner, held in place by careful control.
“For today.”
He stared at her for half a second, then looked away again as if she hadn’t just said sothing that could have turned sentintal if either of them let it.
“You don’t have to thank ,” he said, voice calm, practical. “You dragged around. If anything I should be filing a complaint.”
Esper’s laugh was soft, and it sounded closer to real than most of her laughs had sounded all day.
“You’d be terrible at filing a complaint. You’d write two sentences and then apologise.”
Soren’s eyes narrowed.
“I still don’t get what kind of person you think I am.”
Esper’s gaze flicked to him, amused.
“Soone who doesn’t say what he’s thinking… but is stupidly caring.”
Soren decided not to argue because she wasn’t wrong, and because the conversation was drifting into sothing gentler, and he didn’t want to ruin it by being stubborn.
They walked for another minute, then Soren finally spoke the thought that had been bothering him since breakfast.
“What was the real reason for all of this,” he asked.
Esper’s head tilted a fraction.
“Hm?”
“The date,” he clarified, keeping his tone even so it didn’t sound like an accusation. “It was weird.”
Esper’s mouth twitched, as if she were about to default to a joke. It didn’t fully happen.
The smile stayed, but the words didn’t co out playful.
Soren continued, because if he stopped he would lose the nerve and then he woould spend the next week thinking about it.
“At first I thought you were just ssing with , dragging into a noble restaurant to watch suffer, which you did, by the way.”
Esper’s eyes glead, but she didn’t interrupt.
“But then you took to cheap stores,” Soren went on, “and you actually let buy clothes without trying to bankrupt for fun. That didn’t fit your usual brand of cruelty.”
Esper scoffed quietly, but it wasn’t defensive.
“And then you dragged into a tailoring parlour to get a suit custom made,” he finished, exhaling through his nose. “That also doesn’t fit. You don’t do things like that just for laughs.”
Esper’s gaze stayed forward, and for a mont the street noise filled the gap.
Then she humd, slow and thoughtful, and she didn’t sound bored for once.
“You really can’t handle not knowing,” she murmured.
Soren’s answer was imdiate.
“Nope, I’m too curious.”
Esper’s lips curled slightly, and that tiny movent felt like the closest thing she ever offered to honesty without dressing it up.
“Fair enough.”
He waited, not pushing, because he had learned how Esper worked, and because if he pushed she would make it a ga again.
Esper took a breath that looked more deliberate than it should have been, then spoke, voice still light, but stripped of so of the sparkle.
“I wanted a day where I didn’t have to think,” she said.
Soren blinked.
It was such a simple sentence that it landed heavier than a speech would have.
Esper glanced at him briefly, as if checking his face for pity, then looked away again before he could give her any.
“The restaurant was part of it,” she continued, and the corners of her mouth tightened. “Not the thinking part. The other part.”
“The showing part,” Soren said.
Esper’s eyes narrowed with faint amusent.
“Yes. That part.”
Soren didn’t comnt, because he did understand.
He understood what she had ant by fancy rooms and fancy people smiling while they tried to pick apart your life, and he understood why his discomfort had made her say “I know right~” with genuine amusent, because it wasn’t amusent at him, it was amusent at the fact he could see it so quickly and hate it so openly, when she had been forced to wear it as normal for years.
Esper’s voice carried on, steadier now that she had started.
“I wanted you to know what it feels like,” she said. “Not because I wanted sympathy. Just… knowledge. Because you’re going to end up in those rooms anyway if this engagent stays up, and if it doesn’t, then you’re still you, and your existence seems to attract nonsense.”
Soren’s mouth flattened at that; he couldn’t argue.
Esper’s gaze drifted to a shop window, watching their reflections walk past, her bright outfit beside his uniform, the contrast almost comical.
“The shopping was the not thinking part,” she admitted. “It’s mindless. You walk. You point. You complain. You glare at fabric. It’s nice.”
Soren’s eyebrow lifted.
“I didn’t glare at fabric.”
Esper’s eyes slid to him.
“You glared at at least three jumpers that didn’t look good on you.”
Soren didn’t bother denying it, because that would beco an argunt and she would enjoy it.
Esper’s smile softened a fraction.
“Also, you needed clothes. You dress like you forget you’re allowed to be comfortable and presentable at the sa ti.”
“I was planning to buy so eventually,” Soren muttered.
“Sure you were,” Esper said, tone mild, no bite this ti. “Anyway, I’m not letting my fiancé walk around looking tragic.”
Soren’s eyes narrowed.
“I feel like you keep making a point to call that.”
Esper’s gaze flicked to him.
“Well it’s technically true.”
He sighed, but he didn’t fight it.
Esper’s steps slowed slightly as they passed a quieter side street, and she spoke again, the next part more careful, as if she was choosing words she didn’t like.
“The suit wasn’t for today. Not really,” she said, and her smile thinned again.
“Then what was it for?”
Esper exhaled.
“For later.”
He didn’t continue talking.
He waited, because he could feel the seriousness in the air again, and it wasn’t the restaurant’s expensive silence this ti, it was Esper’s.
“Even if the engagent falls apart, you’ll still need sothing like that soday,” she said, eyes forward, voice quiet. “Because people are going to look at you and decide things, and I’d rather you have armour that fits you properly.”
Soren’s throat felt tight in a way he didn’t enjoy, because he didn’t like being given things that sounded like protection.
Protection ca with debt, and debt made him feel like he owed people parts of himself.
He swallowed it down, kept his face calm.
Esper glanced at him again, and for a mont the mask slipped, not dramatically, just enough that her eyes looked tired in a real way.
“I know you can handle yourself,” she added quickly, as if she could sense the direction his thoughts were trying to go. “I’m not saying you’re weak. I’m saying society is annoying.”
Soren’s mouth twitched faintly.
“That’s true.”
Esper’s smile returned, warr for half a heartbeat.
“See? We agree.”
They walked in silence again for a short stretch, and Soren found himself thinking about yesterday, about letters, about today, about the way she had said she didn’t want to do it alone, and he understood the suit even more.
It was a plan.
It was preparation.
It was her version of controlling what she could control.
————「❤︎」————
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