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Chapter: 69
My Love Is This Pure
Merran changed into her outing dress and waited nervously for the meeting time to come. Earlier, she hadn’t wanted to see Dernick’s face at all, but once she resolved herself, she found she wanted to see him again as soon as possible.
She felt that once she told Dernick she liked him too, everything that had been stuck in place would finally move forward quickly.
‘Yes. Things haven’t progressed because I never properly responded to his proposal.’
The more she thought about it, the more it seemed like the lack of progress was her fault, so she blamed herself several times.
At last, thirty minutes before the arranged time, Merran went outside to wait at the gate.
And as soon as she saw the carriage Dernick often rode approaching and the door opening, Merran rushed inside.
Dernick, caught mid-step opening the door, looked startled, then quickly reached out and pulled her in so she wouldn’t fall, smiling.
“The daughter of Lady Mary flies in like an angel.”
“I look like an angel?”
“Of course. Lady Mary’s daughter is always an angel.”
Hearing the affection overflowing in Dernick’s voice filled Merran with joy. She felt courage rising for what she needed to do.
So when would be the best time and place to bring it up? Merran pondered this as the carriage gently swayed.
Dernick threw in some light jokes as usual to make her laugh, but Merran’s mind was so consumed with the proposal matter that she could barely react.
“My angel. Do you have something on your mind?”
When Dernick asked, Merran seized the moment.
“Yes. Actually, Lord Dernick, there’s something I want to say.”
“Whatever it is, tell me. Even if it’s a difficult request, it’s fine.”
His kind words, one after another, emboldened her. Merran lowered her head slightly and spoke.
“My parents will be leaving soon.”
Dernick burst out laughing.
“That’s something you needed to say so cautiously?”
“Before they leave, I thought you should meet my parents. And we should meet yours too.”
Dernick’s smiling expression turned confused.
“My parents?”
“Yes. The family has to acknowledge us. We can’t just get married on our own and be done.”
Half the smile disappeared from Dernick’s face. Even with her head lowered, Merran kept sneaking glances at him, and that reaction made her heart sink.
Dernick rubbed near his ear, then forced a gentle expression as he asked:
“Um, Miss Merran, maybe I’m misunderstanding… What exactly are we talking about right now?”
Merran gripped her skirt tightly and looked at him, eyes trembling.
“You proposed to me.”
Dernick’s lips twitched.
“Merran, I don’t want to upset you. But I think we need to be clear, so let me ask… When exactly did I do that?”
“The night my aunt got married. At the temple!”
Humiliation made Merran’s voice louder than usual. Her mind went blank as she stared at Dernick’s handsome—still annoyingly perfect—face. Was he joking? He often made careless jokes. Maybe this was one of them. But his expression was unmistakably troubled.
Merran felt like someone who had been sitting relaxed in the best seat at the theater only to suddenly be shoved on stage and made the protagonist.
“I proposed that night? I don’t remember that.”
“You told me you wanted to spend your life with me.”
As Merran choked up, Dernick immediately pulled out a handkerchief to wipe her tears. Merran took it, but in her anger, she shoved him away.
Dernick shifted his seat to avoid her touch, then looked up at the carriage ceiling in silence, as if trying to recall his memory. Merran bit her lip while listening to the steady sound of the wheels. The cheerful voices of passersby outside sounded like the murmurs of theatergoers watching a play.
When the carriage began to slow, Dernick finally spoke.
“Is it when I said I would be your strength for life? Did you take that to mean I wanted to live with you?”
Merran’s face burned and she flung the handkerchief at him.
“You said you’d stay by my side forever!”
Dernick blinked slowly, sighed, and tucked the handkerchief back away. The carriage came to a stop, and a loud voice sounded from outside the driver’s seat.
“Young master, we’ve arrived!”
It seemed they had reached the restaurant. Neither Merran nor Dernick moved.
“Young master!”
When the coachman called again, Dernick knocked lightly on the seat to silence him and then spoke with difficulty.
“Miss Merran, I must have spoken in a confusing way. That’s my fault. Don’t feel embarrassed. But what I meant was that I’d be your friend for life.”
“Oh, my goodness!”
“When I said ‘I’ll stay by your side and support you for life,’ I emphasized ‘always being your strength.’ But you seem to have focused on the ‘stay by your side for life’ part.”
Ashamed, mortified, wanting to disappear, Merran couldn’t speak. She bit her lip, looked at Dernick—and then burst into tears.
“I did think it was a little unclear! So I asked Aunt if it was a proposal, and she said it definitely was! Of course I thought it was a proposal…!”
Dernick sighed and took out another handkerchief, gently wiping her tears again.
“Miss Classie wasn’t even there—why would you ask her? She’s your aunt; naturally she’d tell you something nice.”
“My aunt liked a lot of men. She was proposed to recently and got married, so I thought she’d know.”
Merran kept sobbing. What good would it do to blame Classie now? She wasn’t the one being humiliated—Merran was, sitting right here.
Merran resented Classie. If she had just clearly said, “That’s not a proposal,” when Merran asked, how much better things would have been! Then she would have stayed quiet until she was closer to Dernick, and wouldn’t have told Alice or her father anything about proposals.
But because Classie gave her such a confident answer without knowing anything, everything fell apart. She became a girl who talked about marriage in front of a man who’d never proposed to her.
Merran had never been this embarrassed in her life. She’d been angry and sad many times, but never this mortified.
Dernick carefully held Merran’s arm, then let go and spoke.
“Miss Merran, I do like you.”
“Then why…!”
“But the reason I like you is because you’re Lady Mary’s daughter.”
“!”
“I worship Lady Mary, Miss Merran. To me, Lady Mary is the sun, the light, warmth, and breath. If the god I believe in had a human form, it would be Lady Mary.”
Merran widened her eyes at him. She knew he sometimes spoke of her mother like a zealot, but she’d never heard such outright blasphemous words from him before.
Yet it didn’t feel unpleasant or dangerous—because the person he worshiped was her mother. Her mother, who left only beautiful memories behind before disappearing from Merran’s childhood, was the dearest person in the world to her too.
Merran scolded him quietly.
“You shouldn’t say things like that.”
“Miss Merran, I worship Lady Mary. To me, she’s like a deity. And because of that, you are like an angel. That’s why I can’t marry you. How could I dare marry the daughter of the person I revere?”
Merran grabbed his sleeve in desperation.
“Why not? Then just treat me that much better. Be good to me because you’re grateful to my mother! She would be happy about that too. That’s the best way to repay her.”
Dernick answered seriously.
“That would be sacrilegious.”
Merran felt stunned, as if struck in the head. Classie called Dernick crazy sometimes, and this was the first time Merran completely agreed.
“I don’t understand.”
“That’s because you’re an angel. How could an angel understand the mind of a lowly human like me?”
Dernick smiled gently and, after pausing, continued,
“I cannot love in a worldly way. So my marriage partner will be someone I will never be emotionally entangled with, Miss Merran.”
Merran felt a sting at the back of her neck. What he said seemed both understandable and ridiculous, and suddenly everything felt meaningless.
It was so strange. All she had wanted was pure love. All she had seen in Dernick was purity too.
Meanwhile, her aunt had married with calculation. She flirted with any man who seemed decent, got rejected countless times, and still smiled shamelessly at good men without pride.
So why was her own clean love rejected so absurdly, while her aunt’s worldly love—with all its vulgarity—was accepted?
Unable to withstand the shock, Merran opened the carriage door and jumped out. She couldn’t bear to stay in that cramped space with him any longer.
And at that moment, something huge struck Merran hard as it passed.
* * *
