The Devil Who Breaks My Neck

“……Ezekiel.”

“…….”

“Can you throw me there, too, please?”

The pleading voice was desperate but empty. Ezekiel held Herace’s wrist and placed her hands on both sides of the bed beside her head. It was funny to see him struggling even though it was Herace who was held by him.

“Herace, please…….”

He was frightened. He felt as if Herace was fading away, as if she would disappear forever from him. Ezekiel managed to wring his words suppressing his anxiety.

“Herace, you did nothing wrong. It’s all my fault. It’s all my fault.”

“…….”

“I was stupid. I doubt you for something that didn’t happen. I was out of my mind to doubt you…….”

The stuttering voice was not like him. Herace stared at Ezekiel, who couldn’t even speak properly.

Suddenly, she wondered how she would have solved the misunderstanding, which was hard and like an iron fortress. However, at Ezekiel’s words that followed, Herace’s questions were scattered like fog.

“Erzen… …I’ve committed an indelible sin against our son.”

Ezekiel’s eyes, who uttered Erzen’s name, overflowed with tears of despair and regret.

Herace looked at the man’s tears dripping with emotion. She thought it was funny. She felt angry, like something was scratching at her bottom.

“I dare not ask you for forgiveness. But, Herace, please…… Please don’t say that. Like you said, I deserve to sink into Carbey, but you don’t. I can never put you in a place like that.”

“Then what about Charles?”

When Charles’ name came out, Ezekiel stopped talking. He looked at Herace as if he was looking at a ghost. Herace looked up at Ezekiel with emotion for the first time at his regretful appearance. The straight mouth was twisted.

“I want to tell him that I love him. I want to get on the bed and hold him in my arms.”

“What…?”

“As you suspected, I should have committed adultery with Charles. If I had nodded when he said he loved me…….”

It was also impulsive for Herace to talk about Charles. As Ezekiel’s face crumpled mercilessly, Herace felt joy for the first time in a long while and smiled faintly. This was his bottom line. But the corners of her mouth returned to their places as she had never smiled.

“……No, thinking that. What’s the point of doing that?”

Herace’s heart could no longer contain any emotion. Like a broken glass bottle, nothing but emptiness remained in her mind. Not intending to stop her words from leaking, Herace said to Ezekiel.

“When I do that I want you to regret it and be ashamed.”

Ezekiel stiffened up. Even when his wife was appealing to him, he refused to believe Erzen was his child. But now.

“I will…”

“Don’t do that.”

Herace cut off Ezekiel’s words at once. Her blue eyes unfocused, and completely frozen, stared at Ezekiel.

“You don’t deserve it, Ezekiel.”

He couldn’t be more afraid of his name being called by Herace. Ezekiel trembled as if he was nearing his death. He knew it the moment he saw his wife’s icy blue eyes. That she was erasing him from her memory.

“Herace, please…….”

Despite his entreaties, Herace calmly pulled out her entangled hands from him. Feeling empty as her warm hands moved away, replaced by the touch of the bedsheets on both hands, Ezekiel shook his head and repeatedly said, “Please.” Herace, who was staring vacantly at him, turned her head to the side.

“…… Erzen is my child. My own child. So I don’t want to hear that Erzen is our child or anything like that. Lovely Erzen… It’s an insult to my child.”

There was no emotion in the words of hers towards him in the ear-splitting voice. Ezekiel looked down at Harace’s side face. His wife was separated from him, even though she was lying between his arms, it was the space he had created.

Ezekiel suddenly became afraid of Herace’s thin breath. She became like a transparent and hard glass box, and her expression was so calm that one would think she was dead if they didn’t look carefully. He reached out to Herace, unable to resist.

“I won’t.”

As the man’s hand approached, Herace closed her eyes and said. Ezekiel’s hand stopped in the air at the perfect rejection. Herace turned her head away, turning away from him.

“……I won’t do anything you think.”

For the time being.

Herace deliberately swallowed the latter part. Not right now, but at an early date she intended to follow Erzen. There was one reason she didn’t go after Erzen right away.

“Mom!”

Whenever she closed her eyes… she could still see Erzen’s face. Her son’s laughter rang in her ears. However, if she admitted to her son’s death, it was clear that this would disappear in a moment.

“Can you leave now?”

Herace, who was estimating how long she had left, pulled up the sheet to bury her face when Erzen’s face became clearer. Ezekiel raised himself from the bed hesitantly. Standing at the bedside, he was about to leave, but he looked back at his wife and spoke.

“……I put Erzen in a safe place. Tell me whenever you want to see him.”

Even after the words, Ezekiel stood for a long time. Maybe she could feel his gaze looking at her, but Herace put the sheet over her head instead of looking at him. Then there was a sound of dragging steps, and soon the door closed.

“……Lies.”

As the surroundings became quiet, Herace murmured. Tears that she thought had dried up flowed down her cheeks. The sheet wrapped around her shook up and down along her shaking shoulders.

“My son is here. Isn’t that right, Erzen?”

The distorted view caught Erzen with a smiling face. Herace gave a big hug to the child who had dug into her arms.

The only things caught in the white hand were shallow sheets and empty air. Nevertheless, Herace smiled warmly and kissed her son’s forehead.

“Mother loves you, Erzen.”

***

Time passed away as usual. Herace did not get out of bed even after Ezekiel left. Lying still like a corpse trapped in a coffin was all she did.

Almost every hour Helen came in, examined her, and served a meal tailored to the instructions of the doctor. The warm food, carefully prepared, looked delicious, but as soon as Herace smelled it, she felt like emptying her stomach. In the end, Helen could only drink a few sips of water to Herace all day.

“You must eat something, anything tomorrow, Madam.”

“…….”

“You’ll get sick at this rate.”

“…can you please get out? I want to rest alone.”

Helen rose quietly from her seat as she tried to say more. Her face, staring at Herace until she went out, was full of worry and anxiety, but Herace did not notice.

When Helen left, silence fell in the room. In the quiet space, Herace remained unmoved like an inanimate object. Empty eyes looking at the ceiling, lips closed in a straight line, hands so pale that can’t be seen with open eyes……. Only the occasional tears dripping down her fine cheeks told that she was thinking of something.

That’s how time flew by. The sun was quite long for the season of early summer, but it was completely dark soon. Helen came in a couple more times. As the evening passed and the night when the moon rose came. The bright full moon lit up Herace’s white face even more white.

Rattle.

On a windless night, the window opened itself. Then the curtain shook and the air cooled as ‘It’ entered. But Herace only blinked, and did not intend to close the window or call Helen herself.

Squeak.

The window hinges, folded and unfolded repeatedly, making an eerie sound. And at one point, a child stood in the room with his back to the moon. The white moonlight glistened the child’s silver hair like platinum.

“Hello.”

Herace recognized the child’s presence only after he said hello. At first glance, she seemed surprised by the slight movement. But soon Herace’s eyes became numb, as if she had guessed who has come.

“…… I thought it was strange, but I can tell from the look. You’re not a human, right?”

The child’s hands and arms were covered with black scales. Long black nails at the end of each finger with its vertically torn pupils. He shrugged his shoulders. At the same time, the scales disappeared and the arms and pupils regained their human form.

“Is that true?”

“…….”

“I’m not afraid…… It’s just a little lame.”

Despite Herace’s indifference, Miguel’s smiling face did not change. Instead of approaching Herace, the child sat on the windowsill and whispered in a small but deep voice.

“It’s not that important. More than that, do you want my help?”

“…….”

“Don’t you want revenge?”

The charming laughter that accompanied at the end of the words were enough to captivate and enchant people. But Herace replied with an indifferent look as if she were not interested.

“To whom?”

“What do you mean to whom? It’s your husband. Your husband who brought in a mistress and gave birth to an illegitimate child. Your husband who doubted your love, cheated, misunderstood your own child, and eventually killed your son. I mean Ezekiel.”

“…….”

“Don’t you want to get back at Ezekiel?”

It was a question, but ‘It’ said in a voice as if it was sure of the answer. Miguel jumped down from the window frame and stood next to Herace. The child waited for her words and continued to expect something. But Herace only shook her head as she looked at the lively child’s red cheeks.

“…I don’t need it.”

“Why?”

“…….”

“I can make him suffer, Erzen…… He’s the one who killed your child. You can stab him in the heart over and over again. But why don’t you need revenge?”

It was frustrating for him seeing Herace so indifferent, so spat out his words quickly with a big frown. After a long sigh, the child climbed up to the bed and lay beside Herace and looked at her. His amber eyes were waiting for an answer. So Herace opened her mouth after a long time.

“Then, will Erzen come back?”

“…….”

“If I stab his heart with a sword over and over again, thousands of times, will my son come back alive?”

“…….”

“I’m exhausted.”

“…….”

“To pour something out on him…… I’m tired. I’m so tired. I want to rest now.”

There is nothing left in the weak voice. Herace was crushed like a coral that was cut tens of thousands of times by the strong waves and eventually scattered into the sand.