My Unrequited Love Is an Absolute Secret - Chapter 82

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 82

Jessie’s House had poor soundproofing, making it unsuitable for the conversation we needed to have.
Especially considering what we were about to discuss.
I climbed into the car as Jessie suggested.
“Should we go to the Cafe?”
I asked while fastening my seatbelt, but Jessie shook his head.
It was a natural response, considering we’d had a heated argument in front of the Cafe just days ago.
“Let’s go to Coney Island.”
“Now? Won’t it be cold?”
Coney Island was an Amusement Park at the southern edge of Brooklyn.
It took about thirty minutes by car from Jessie’s House, which was located on the eastern outskirts of Brooklyn.
“I want to get some fresh air.”
“Okay.”
We had the car anyway.
If it got too cold while walking, we could always get back in.
I started the engine and pulled out.
Only the sound of music filled the space between us until we arrived at our destination.
“We’re here. Let’s get out.”
“Yeah.”
After parking in the Parking Lot, we walked along the Beach.
Normally, this place would be bustling with people visiting the Amusement Park and joggers.
But today, with the cold winter weather, there were hardly any people around.
As we walked watching the waves endlessly roll in and recede, a seagull flew overhead, crying out harshly.
…!
Startled, I grabbed Jessie’s arm tightly.
Jessie, who had been walking with a dark expression, looked at me and let out a soft laugh.
“Are you still afraid of seagulls?”
“They’re not just seagulls—they’re gangsters.”
I grumbled while staying alert, unsure when the seagull might dive again.
It was from the first time Jessie and I came to Coney Island.
It was a sweltering summer then, and seeing how much I suffered from the heat, my parents bought me gelato.
Just as I was about to take an excited bite, I was surrounded by a flock of seagulls.
It happened in the brief moment my parents looked away while paying for the gelato.
Though Jessie and my parents chased the seagulls away moments later, all the gelato was stolen, and I was left with disheveled hair, crying my eyes out.
“I developed a bird phobia because of them.”
I shuddered, saying that even seeing pigeons now brings back the terror from that childhood moment.
“Ha, I know. You clung to me like this back then and cried so hard. Remember?”
Jessie recalled the same memory and laughed.
The tension that had lingered between us dissolved softly.
“I even said I’d protect you from seagulls for the rest of my life.”
“You said that?”
“I did.”
Jessie spoke while gazing beyond the horizon.
“Looking back, that moment felt like the happiest time of my life.”
“Jessie….”
“I quit the escort work. You won’t have to worry about anything anymore.”
It was good news to hear.
Since I’d come here to persuade him to quit that job, a weight lifted from my shoulders.
Yet Harry couldn’t bring herself to rejoice immediately.
“Are you sure? You needed the money… wasn’t that why you were doing it?”
Jessie immediately understood what Harry was concerned about and exhaled softly.
It was because of her tender heart—still worrying about him even after being so disappointed in him.
“I don’t urgently need money right now. I did that work purely out of my own selfishness.”
As Jessie exhaled, his breath dispersed like cigarette smoke in the cold air.
“I wanted to return to where I originally lived—Brooklyn Heights.”
….
“Right next to you.”
Harry’s feet froze in place.
Jessie turned his body toward her as she stood motionless.
“Lili, truly, I… didn’t want to lose you. I just wanted to reclaim my place.”
“Jessie.”
“But I disappointed you.”
He reached out and slowly brushed her cheek.
Her cheek was flushed red from the harsh wind blowing in from the winter sea.
“I’ve thought about it tens, hundreds, thousands of times. If my father hadn’t gotten cancer, we would have definitely kissed that day.”
Jessie whispered while cradling her cold cheek.
Moisture glistened in his blue eyes, making the pain in the heart of anyone who saw him even more acute.
“I would have asked you to be my girlfriend, and surely you would have said yes. We would have become the happiest couple in the world.”
A teardrop that had precariously clung to his long lashes finally rolled down his cheek, hot and heavy.
“Every night I pray. I pray to turn back time to that night. If I could only go back to then, I’d do anything. If you still love me, I could even offer my soul.”
Harry’s eyes, meeting his, also filled with tears.
“I’m sorry for disappointing you. It’s natural that you resent me. Still, please, don’t say you don’t love me anymore.”
….
“I love you, Lili. I love you more than anyone in the world.”
Jessie wept as he spoke of love.
An emotion that could have brought excitement and joy to someone brought only pain and sorrow to him.
His feelings were so vivid that Harry felt them as if they were her own, and she wept alongside him.
Anyone else would have done the same.
Seeing that golden hair, always luminous and radiant, trembling pitifully in the fierce wind, and those jewel-like blue eyes glistening with tears.
Even someone meeting him for the first time today would have gladly wept for him.
“Please don’t cry. This isn’t the face I wanted to see.”
Yet watching Harry cry, Jessie pleaded as though he might collapse to his knees at any moment.
I had imagined confessing to her countless times.
In every imagining, Harry would smile shyly or nod with joy.
Perhaps she might even cry from being moved.
But Harry crying with this expression had never existed in any of my imaginings.
If only I could stop her tears….
Just as Jessie bent forward to kiss her.
Harry turned her head away, evading him.
It was an unmistakable rejection.
“Is it because I’m filthy?”
Jessie desperately tried to meet Harry’s gaze, but she squeezed her eyes shut entirely.
“It’s too late, Jessie.”
….
“It’s simply too late now.”
As if to deny her words, Jessie shook his head repeatedly.
“No.”
His hands trembled as they cradled Harry’s face, grasping at sand slipping through his palms.
“You’re teasing me, aren’t you? Tell me you are.”
Pressing his forehead against hers, rubbing his nose against hers, Jessie denied it endlessly.
But Harry’s eyes never once turned toward him.
It looked exactly like her heart, firmly sealed shut.
“…Is it because of Aemerus Huntington?”
A man’s instinct was telling him.
Whether Jessie had struck a nerve, Harry’s body flinched.
“You’ve fallen for him. That’s why you’re rejecting me.”
Even as he muttered like a madman, Harry did not deny it.
Jessie’s heart, which had hoped she would deny it—even if it were a lie—crumbled to dust.
“I didn’t ask you to belong to Aemerus….”
What good would regret do now?
Even knowing it was meaningless, Jessie could not let go of his lingering attachment.
“Why Aemerus of all people?”
Suppressing the urge to go to Aemerus right now and throw a punch, Jessie asked.
“Is it because he has more money than me? Or because he’s more handsome?”
“It’s not for reasons like that.”
Harry shook her head, tears streaming down her face.
“Aemerus has always been there for me.”
“….”
“Whenever I needed him, he always came running to me.”
The fury that had consumed Jessie’s body drained away in an instant.
Jessie had no choice but to acknowledge the truth, however much it pained him.
What Harry wanted wasn’t simply a wealthy, handsome boyfriend—she wanted a man who would be by her side.
In joy and in sorrow, unchanging.
“I’m sorry, Jessie.”
Her apology cut deeper than any regret about having loved him could have.
“I’ve fallen in love with Aemerus.”
It wasn’t that Aemerus had stolen Harry from him.
Jessie had simply let her slip away.
With visibly trembling hands, he caressed her cheek.
His fist clenched as he lowered his head, as if to kiss her tear-dampened face again.
Straining with every ounce of willpower until the veins on the back of his hand stood out, he finally forced himself to pull away.
It was a movement as agonizing as forcibly separating the opposing poles of a magnet.
“Does that bastard love you too?”
Of course he did, damn it.
What man in this world wouldn’t love Lili?
If such a man existed, his heart would surely be nothing but cold stone.
Jessie bit the inside of his cheek, cursing himself for asking such a foolish question.
“Probably….”
“Probably?”
“Actually, Aemerus confessed his feelings a few days ago…. But now I’m not sure.”
So even that stoic bastard had managed a confession.
Yet seeing that Harry wasn’t certain of his feelings, Jessie sensed an opening remained.
“My heart won’t change.”
“….”
“I’ll wait. So come to me whenever you need to.”
Jessie had been Harry’s first love.
So there was no reason he couldn’t be her second.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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