3: 3

By the dim light of the stairwell I studied her closely, and in that moment I realized how much more we looked alike than I'd thought.

Illness had left her pale and drawn, but the shape of her face and the way her hair fell were exactly like mine.

The twisting pain in my chest, which had only just begun to ease, surged up again, and without thinking I braced myself against the wall.

She walked slowly up to me and said softly,

“Elle? I'm sorry. I didn't come to find you to cause trouble.”

“I only wanted to ask you something. You like Marlin, don't you?”

I stared at her and said nothing.

I didn't want to lay this twisted love at the feet of a girl who had so little time left.

None of this was her fault. The one at fault was the man who was using me as a stand-in.

“I know you like him. The way you look at him is exactly the way I look at him.”

As she said it her voice grew urgent, and she reached out as if to grab hold of me, then let her hand fall weakly back.

“Elle, after I'm gone, will you take care of him for me?”

I stood there staring at Carmen Fox, and the whole thing struck me as utterly absurd.

In a way, she and Marlin were rather alike.

One of them wanted a stand-in to numb himself; the other, afraid of his grief, wanted the stand-in to stay by his side.

She bit her lip, her eyes rimmed red, and forced the words out through a sob,

“He seems mature, but he's actually so childish. The smallest thing sets him off, and he gets stuck in his own head……”

“When I'm gone, he's sure to cry. And once he's cried, he'll bottle it up. He'd never let anyone see.”

“He's afraid of the dark, too. He hates being alone. At night he always needs a light on to fall asleep.”

With every word she said, my heart sank a little further.

The Marlin I remembered was always calm, always level-headed.

But it turned out that was only because he never needed to show me anything fragile.

His childishness, his fears—all of it belonged only to the Carmen Fox standing in front of me.

The dull ache in my chest swelled harder, and I cut her off, my voice hoarse.

“I don't like Marlin. You've got the wrong person.”

I couldn't bear to look at the shock in her eyes, and even less could I bear to admit that I was nothing but a pitiful replacement.

Like some disgraced coward, I turned and fled.

I ran the whole way back to my room, hastily swallowed the medicine the nurse had brought, and had just started to lie down when a panicked screaming rose up from below.

“Someone jumped!”

“It's Miss Fox—Carmen Fox jumped!”

4: 4

I shoved myself up against the edge of the bed and lunged to the window to look down.

On the open ground below, Carmen Fox lay in a spreading, glaring pool of blood.

Medical staff crowded around her, but every one of them only shook their heads, helpless.

Seconds later, Marlin Delgado threw himself down beside her like a man gone mad, his voice shaking. :

“Carmen, look at me……open your eyes and look at me, please?”

The doctor beside him had reddened eyes as he tried to soothe him. :

“Marlin, I'm so sorry……”

“This is a release for Miss Fox, in a way. She didn't want to keep suffering, and even less did she want to be a burden to you……”

But the words only broke Marlin further. He drove his fist into the ground, blood seeping from his knuckles, and he seemed not to feel the pain at all. :

“It's my fault……it's all my fault, I didn't watch over her……”

As he spoke, he pulled off his white coat, spread it carefully beneath Carmen Fox, then bent down and lifted her body into his arms.

“Director, I'm resigning.”

The hospital director rushed forward and grabbed hold of him. :

“Marlin, have you lost your mind?”

“You're in the prime of your career, the sharpest new blade in surgery. Don't throw it away over……”

Marlin looked down at the silent figure in his arms, his eyes dead to the core. :

“I couldn't even save the person I loved most. This white coat, on me, doesn't mean anything anymore.”

I clung to the window frame, my nails clawing bloody scratches into it.

The searing pain in my chest hit me again, more violent than any time before.

I watched with my own eyes as that man, after Carmen Fox died, became a shell with the soul drained clean out of it.

My vision began to blur, a ringing filling my ears.

The pain peaked, the world went suddenly black, and I lost consciousness once more.

When I opened my eyes again, the first thing I registered was the smell of disinfectant.

I turned my head and saw Marlin Delgado sitting in the chair by the bed. His white coat was gone, replaced by a crisp white T-shirt.

It took only a second for it to hit me: I was back.

But what was this supposed to be?

Had I watched, with my own eyes, the fierce, undying love between Marlin Delgado and Carmen Fox, only to come back and go on being the stand-in no one ever knew about?

Marlin, who had stayed at my side the whole time, softened around the eyes and said quietly, :

“Elle, you're finally awake. Do you have any idea you've been unconscious for three days?”

I stared at him, my throat dry and tight, and asked with a bitter smile, :

“Did you cry, then?”

He frowned faintly at that, his tone touched with reluctance. :

“I'm a grown man. Why would I cry?”

In that moment, I laughed until the tears came.

But I've seen it, Marlin.

I've seen you fall apart for Carmen Fox, undone with grief, wild and broken and begging.

The words jammed in my throat, and before I could get them out, Marlin had already reached up and pressed the call button, telling the doctor to come check on me again.

After the doctor finished the examination, he spoke. :

“Nothing serious. All your readings are normal. We can't pin down the exact cause of the sudden fainting for now. Our guess is that it's the workload, that you've overdrawn yourself.”

“Go home and rest properly for a while. No more high-intensity work.”

Marlin agreed, handled the discharge paperwork, and steadied me the whole way out, softly laying out my schedule going forward. :

“This is a good chance to rest up. We'll figure out the rest once you're back on your feet.”

“As it happens, I've set something up with a client. A soft, gentle-styled shoot in a month.”

Numbly, I followed him out of the inpatient building.

Every shooting style he had locked in for me over the years had been the same gentle, tender line.

I used to naively think it was his sharp professional eye, that he'd decided this quality suited me best.

Now that I'd lived through everything of his from ten years ago, I finally understood.

Carmen Fox had been exactly this soft, gentle sort of woman. He'd only, without thinking, molded me into the image of the great love in his memory.

Marlin walked to the car and, out of habit, reached up to open the passenger door for me.

But this time, nothing in me stirred anymore.

I stopped where I stood, lifted my eyes to his gentle face, and said, with absolute certainty, :

“Marlin Delgado, let's break up.”