I Don’t Want to be a Villainess

…You think I wouldn’t know such things?

I looked up at him and thought.

He looked exactly like me, but the reason I took on this appearance was that I found it hard to look him in the eye otherwise.

A dazzling ball of light.

The person who literally reshaped the direction of my life.

…Sorry to say, but I’ve already read his thoughts.

No, should I apologize to my friends too, since I told them similar lies?

Just like this person can read my memories, I could access his memories to some extent.

And in the time I’ve spent with him, I’ve wandered through his memories quite a bit. Just like he does now.

Not all memories are joyful.

But that doesn’t mean all memories are bad either.

Sometimes sad, sometimes gloomy, sometimes difficult, but,

sometimes laughing, sometimes having fun, sometimes feeling joy.

Unlike my monotonous memories, his memories were colorful and long, and I couldn’t see them all.

Yet somehow, there were memories that made me feel I understood why he felt that way.

Unlike my selfish and twisted personality, he was kind and sincere.

And because he was that kind of person, he must be trying to return my life to me.

…But I don’t want that.

No, it wasn’t that I hated my life. He transformed the life I despised and loathed into one that he absolutely doesn’t want to lose.

But I don’t want him to leave from that life.

Ha Neul, Sohee, Sua. And everyone who helps me. I know they are the beings that make up my life.

But it was this person who connected all those beings to my life.

If this person disappears, my life loses that much meaning.

The biggest being that constitutes my current life. If the thread connecting all of that disappears, I wouldn’t know how to live.

So, no.

Don’t leave.

Let’s stay here together for a long time.

Please.

I thought that way.

“……”

As I leaned a little closer and crossed my arms, he relaxed his arm a bit and accepted my touch. Though it was just an unsubstantial memory, a fantasy as if in a dream, his body was warm. It was big enough for me to lean on.

Doing this calmed my heart. I felt like I could do anything.

Does he feel the same way?

“……But I have a question.”

After a while of silence, he suddenly spoke up as if he thought of something.

“Hmm?”

In response to my inquiry, he fidgeted with his neck.

“About this.”

He was touching the part of the fabric hanging from his neck.

The shirt he was wearing was quite different from an ordinary shirt. In fact, it was the kind of outfit that would likely get someone to ask if it was a cosplay if worn nowadays, adorned with vintage decorations.

It wasn’t a woman’s outfit. If anything, it looked more like something a man would wear.

It had sporadic lace, and the fabric hanging from his neck was so long it was hard to distinguish if it was lace or a scarf. In contrast, the pants were plain black without any decoration.

It was the kind of outfit that would make one think of the ‘Renaissance.’

An outfit that the male lead would likely wear in foreign movies or dramas set in that era, with a few buttons undone.

“Um, isn’t this something you’d wear in the medieval… Actually, should I say Renaissance period? Isn’t it from around that time?”

At that question, my face flushed.

To be honest, that outfit was entirely styled for my taste.

“Um….”

As I kept silent, he thought for a moment and then asked a question I never saw coming.

“Um, did you take this from that novel you wrote a while back?”

At that moment, my head went blank.

“Ah, wait…!”

As my mind filled with white, the room began to fill with white as well.

He grabbed my shoulder and said, “Wait a second, pull yourself together!”

“Eh…?”

He shook my shoulder, and I managed to hold onto the sanity that was about to fly away.

When I finally gathered my thoughts, everything around us, except for the bed we were sitting on, had turned into a state of nothingness.

Well, even if everything around us had turned white, I thought it wouldn’t harm him…

But still, thank goodness. I could have ruined the mood—

—Oh wait, it actually got ruined.

“Th-That, th-th-that….”

I wanted to ask, “Did you read it?” but then thought that would be a ridiculously foolish question.

Of course, he must have read it. He must have already read my farewell letter.

…But that’s the thing. My farewell letter didn’t contain anything embarrassing. It was simply filled with things I wanted to tell my mother and was filled with sincerity throughout.

However, with the novel that was in the same drawer, the story was different.

…It was what I had wished for while living.

So, to put it another way, it was a novel filled with unrealistic fantasies that would never come true.

No, could it even be called a novel?

Moreover, even if I liked the latter part, the first part made me cringe to think of now.

No matter how detached I was from others, I still felt embarrassed about showing something like that. Compared to the books I read… No, it was an item that couldn’t even be compared.

“Mmm….”

Seeing my extremely flustered face, he seemed to consider something and spoke in a slightly hesitant voice.

He probably couldn’t have imagined I would be this embarrassed.

“Um, I don’t think you need to be too embarrassed. No one other than me has probably read it.”

“……Really?”

Thankfully, none of my friends had brought up the subject of that novel.

But he hadn’t said a word about the novel until now, either.

“Umm… probably?”

And as expected, the answer was hesitantly ambiguous.

I held my head. Observing me, he appeared even more flustered and patted my back.

“Uh, it’s okay. How rare is it for someone to finish a novel in their lifetime? You’ve completed one, so you don’t need to be too embarrassed. You wrote much better as it went on.”

“Oh, hee….”

Hearing that, I shivered with embarrassment.

That means he’s saying he read the whole thing.

…Why did I leave that part in? If I thought there was something wrong with it, I should have just thrown it out. I should have torn it up ages ago.

But the latter part… In other words, the completed part of the novel, I simply couldn’t throw away.

Though it might seem insignificant to others, it was a story I had crafted with my own strength during my childhood. If I were to count the ‘things I did properly in my life,’ that would be the only one.

So, I couldn’t just recklessly dispose of it.

…Or rather, it would be more reasonable to say that I had never thought someone would read it in the first place.

That’s right. I had become so accustomed to living alone that I hadn’t even thought of bringing my friends over.

Should I ask him not to read it right now?

No, would that just pique his curiosity?

No, more than that, what if I heard him say, ‘Um… Sorry, I’ve already read it…’?

“Um, so,”

While I huddled for a while, he started to pat my back again and cautiously opened his mouth once more.

“You really don’t need to feel embarrassed. Not everyone in the world has read it. And again, it’s important to remember that completing a story isn’t easy. So many people give up after writing just the beginning. The fact that you were able to finish it is something amazing.”

“……Really?”

I cautiously looked up at him and asked. He nodded with a smile on his face.

“Of course.”

“Then, have you ever done something like this?”

I asked, almost pleadingly.

“Um… Well…,”

After a moment of contemplation, he clapped his hands and said,

“Oh, right! I have an unfinished plastic model from my childhood lying around. I never got to finish those…”

“That’s different!”

I interrupted him mid-sentence.

“How about writing? Or comics? Have you ever jotted down any thoughts in a notebook?”

“Uh, um….”

He couldn’t bring himself to answer.

“……”

I stared up at him.

Aha.

So, he was ‘unable to answer.’

Which means, he couldn’t say ‘no.’

“You have, then.”

As I said that, his body flinched.

“Oh, um, yeah!”

He quickly turned his head and said, “Isn’t it about to be morning soon? It’ll be time to wake up before long—”

“Stop spouting nonsense. You know I set the alarm before sleeping.”

I raised myself up and shoved my face close to his.

“Show me too.”

“Uh….”

“Show me. It’s unfair for you to see it alone.”

“Ah, I didn’t bring my notebook when I came over here…”

If it’s memories, I could read them.

…But there’s no reason to reveal that right now.

“Then tell me. I won’t tell anyone.”

As soon as I changed my words, he closed his eyes, deep in thought, and eventually let out a big sigh.

“Okay, fine….”

“Hehe.”

I pounced on him and rested on his knees.

“……So…,”

He hesitated, then began to speak.

And thus, we added one more secret to share.

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