I No Longer Have Love to Offer You - Chapter 14

Without a doubt, the period when Mirabelle attended the academy was when her relationships with Ricardo, Ludovic, and Marietta were the most distant. Consciously maintaining an appropriate distance from her childhood friends, Mirabelle prioritized her connections with classmates and other students. Even if Ricardo complained about her being distant, she would still prioritize plans with classmates over him and that was precisely why.

(After all, Ricardo only invites me because Marietta told him to.)

That thought crossed her mind too.

And it wasn’t entirely wrong. When Mirabelle told Marietta that she wanted to prioritize time with her classmates for a while, Ricardo stopped inviting her altogether.

And so, for the first time, Mirabelle began spending more time with people other than her childhood friends.

In fact, she met Albert because they were in the same class. They ended up in the same group for a research presentation—Mirabel, Albert, the marquis’s daughter Pamela Wilson, and the count’s son Killian Lowe.

Pamela, despite being the daughter of a high-ranking noble family, was down-to-earth and never flaunted her status. Killian, though serious and somewhat inflexible, was unusually sincere for noble society. Together with Albert and Mirabel, the group worked surprisingly well.

Even back then, Albert had the same elusive, hard-to-pin-down personality he had now, and his strong quirks hadn’t changed either. Still, whether it was good compatibility or simply because they were all straightforward people, the four of them grew very close in no time.

(Now that I think about it, that might have been the freest I’ve ever felt emotionally.)

She thought so because, at all other times, her childhood friends were always nearby not just physically, but emotionally as well.

Mirabelle had always been bound to Ricardo, but the time she spent at the academy was the only period when she could distance herself from her own feelings for him. And if only those feelings had faded away completely, things might have been different.

But in the end, just half a month before graduation, she let go of the future she might have had.

“Mirabel, I love you. Will you give me the right to stand by your side?”

Albert had said those words to her during the academy’s graduation ceremony.

Mirabelle hadn’t realized his feelings. And by then, her marriage to Ricardo had already been decided.

“Thank you for thinking of me. But… I’m sorry. I can’t return your feelings.”

“What are you going to do now?”

“I’m to marry into the Hylas family.”

“Hylas? You mean, Ricardo Hylas?”

Albert must have known it was hopeless when he confessed. After all, at that point, he was still just the third son of a marquis, with no clear future ahead. Since he wasn’t involved in his family’s affairs, it would have been difficult for him to marry and support a noble wife right after graduation.

Even so, he must have been worried about Mirabel, who had lost her parents and had nowhere to go. And of course, his feelings had been genuine.

“Yes. That’s right.”

“But you were avoiding Ricardo Hylas, weren’t you?”

(You noticed?)

Mirabelle was surprised by Albert’s words. Ricardo had occasionally visited her classroom though less frequently than before, she hadn’t completely cut ties with him. And whenever he did, he was usually with Marietta.

There had been times when she couldn’t bear to see the two of them together and had asked Albert and the others to cover for her absence. Albert must have understood why.

“That’s true. I did avoid him.”

“Then why?! That guy is—”

“Ricardo asked me to walk through life with him!”

The thought of facing reality was unbearable. She didn’t want to hear Albert say anything about Ricardo and Marietta, so she cut him off sharply.

“It’s true that Ricardo might have had feelings for Marietta. But he chose me to be the one he’d spend his life with.”

Even Mirabelle didn’t know if Ricardo had truly been able to let go of his feelings for Marietta. Still, she wanted to believe his words. She wanted to hold on to the joy she had felt when he proposed.

“…I see. I’m sorry for raising my voice.”

Albert lowered his head, clenching his fists tightly at his sides as if holding something back. A heavy silence fell between them, so deep they could almost hear each other’s breathing.

“Listen…”

Albert was the one who finally broke the silence.

“If anything ever troubles you in the future, promise me you’ll reach out.”

Once she graduated and married Ricardo, she wouldn’t be able to casually contact her old school friends especially if Albert remained unmarried. At most, they might exchange seasonal greetings by letter to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings.

“All right.”

She didn’t think anything troubling would happen once she married Ricardo, but Mirabelle agreed anyway.

“Promise me.”

“I promise.”

At Albert’s insistence, she answered, and he pressed his lips together tightly, staring at her. She couldn’t tell what emotion flickered in his unwavering gaze, but she met his eyes without looking away.

This was likely the last time they’d speak like this.

With silent gratitude in her heart.

Saying goodbye to Albert was also saying goodbye to her childhood. She might see Pamela again another woman but Pamela was a marquis’s daughter, and Mirabelle would be a viscount’s wife. Unlike the academy, where equality was upheld, noble society would emphasize the difference in their ranks. And as for Killian, being a man, their relationship would be just as restricted as with Albert.

And so, holding onto their happy memories, they would walk separate paths.

Believing those paths would never cross again, Mirabelle tucked the memory of that day deep into her heart.