Chapter 32

Dante stayed inside the room alone, staring in the direction Rhys had gone for a long while. Once Rhys—the source of all his anguish and heartbreak—disappeared, his mind went strangely blank. Perhaps it had only been bearable until now because Rhys had been standing right in front of him.

When he went home, he would do exactly as Rhys had said.

If he followed Rhys’s advice and deleted the photos because it would be easier to forget that way, perhaps he really could move on. Rhys was far more clearheaded and intelligent than he was. He would gather and sort out the gifts from Rhys that he had never once thought of throwing away, and the toothbrush he had kept in case Rhys came over before they began living together, and…

The moment he realized he would have to dismantle all of it with his own hands, a violent wave of nausea rose in his stomach. The pillow Rhys had used, which he had still kept; the T-shirt Rhys had left behind; all the traces of Rhys that existed in his daily life—no sooner did he imagine erasing them than a blinding headache surged. The pain burned so fiercely through his skull that, seized by sickness, Dante ran straight to the hallway bathroom.

He barely managed to lift the toilet lid before bitter stomach acid came up. Everything he had eaten on the plane had long since digested, leaving nothing to vomit. After dry-heaving again and again through the twisting pain in his gut, his body finally calmed after what felt like an eternity.

His stomach burned, and dizziness washed over him in waves. Having experienced so little real physical illness in his life, these sensations felt frighteningly unfamiliar. It felt as though something vital had been forcibly ripped out of him, leaving him completely hollow inside and chilled to the bone.

Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he flushed the toilet once more and stood at the sink for a long time, rinsing his mouth and spitting the water out. Even then, he felt filthy. He wanted to wash.

The shower was located inside the main bedroom, so after a moment of hesitation, Dante stepped into the room Rhys would be using. The instant he crossed the threshold, he caught Rhys’s faint, floral scent. Perhaps because of that familiar smell, his churning stomach settled slightly. At the same time, a strange certainty overcame him: if he could just breathe in Rhys’s scent more strongly, this nausea would ease completely.

Perfume. I need to find Rhys’s perfume.

Driven by a conviction nearly indistinguishable from pure impulse, Dante searched the entire room in a frenzy. He returned to the bathroom and checked every corner near the sink, but found nothing. He checked the shower booth, the bed, the nightstand, the window sill, beside the television, and inside the drawers. Nowhere did he find anything resembling a perfume bottle. Rhys’s scent merely lingered faintly in the air, doing nothing but making Dante desperate.

After chasing those elusive traces like a madman, Dante came to an abrupt stop, his head turning slowly toward Rhys’s suitcase resting on the floor. The scent felt stronger over there.

Perfume. Could it be in there?

As if bewitched, Dante walked toward the luggage. It felt certain, somehow, that it would be inside. Staggering to a stop in front of it, he sank to his knees as though his legs had collapsed, touching the locked suitcase lying flat before him. Staring at it, he reached out and turned the dials on the lock.

Eight. One. Five.

With trembling fingertips, he set the familiar three digits, then pushed the latch.

Click.

The mechanism caught, and the fixed suitcase zippers came free. At that exact instant, a sensation like his chest twisting in on itself swept through him, followed by a wave of dizziness.

Breathing became difficult. Panting, he hurriedly pulled the zipper open. The small carry-on luggage revealed neatly folded clothes the moment it parted, and the scent of Rhys’s laundry detergent and perfume rose thickly into the air.

As soon as Dante inhaled it, his pounding heart slowly began to calm. He bent over the suitcase and pressed his forehead directly against the clothes. Carefully, he rubbed the high bridge of his nose against the fabric, then laid his cheek there. Warmth began to gather where his skin met the soft cotton shirt.

You forgot to change the password you set to my birthday.

Bent over with his cheek pressed to Rhys’s clothes, he slowly stroked the folded garments with his palm. With his eyes slightly unfocused, Dante kept touching Rhys’s clothes as if he couldn’t stop.

Before he met Rhys, he had never particularly told people his birthday, since even his own family had barely acknowledged it. He thought he had mentioned it to previous lovers, but they had either broken up before the date arrived or simply let the day pass forgotten. He had never been disappointed back then, because he had never expected anything. But after meeting Rhys, he had begun celebrating birthdays.

Through Rhys, he had learned how wonderful it felt to have someone precious celebrate his very existence.

But we won’t celebrate together this year. Not your birthday three months from now, not Thanksgiving, not Christmas. Choosing what to give you when special days came around was one of my greatest joys.

As those useless thoughts continued and he lay there for a long time, both his headache and nausea settled completely. Slowly lifting himself, Dante looked down at the clothes his cheek had been resting on, then picked up a specific item. He recognized it instantly—it was a gray hoodie Rhys wore from time to time.

Because his cheek had been pressed to it for so long, he worried he might have dirtied it. Wondering if he should have it laundered before Rhys returned, he set the thin hoodie aside, then carefully rummaged through the rest of the suitcase. In keeping with Rhys’s meticulous personality, every piece of clothing had been organized into compression bags, each one folded with sharp precision.

His toiletries and personal items had been separated into neat pouches, so Dante took out both and opened them. Surely Rhys would have put it somewhere like this… But neither pouch contained perfume. Thinking it might be tucked into one of the side compartments, Dante searched carefully all the way to the bottom, but there was nothing resembling perfume anywhere. The only thing close was a bottle that looked like fabric deodorizer.

…Or did he take the perfume out with him?

If Rhys had brought it in a travel-sized bottle, it was highly possible. His scent had faded and deepened in turns. Dante forced down his disappointment, restored the inside of the suitcase as closely as he could to its original state, and closed it. When he returned to the sitting room, the dizziness and chills swept over him once more.

Dante could not understand what was happening to his body. These intermittent headaches and sudden waves of nausea were entirely unfamiliar. Before becoming a Coast Guard rescue swimmer, he had worked as an EMT in a hospital to build experience, so he had picked up plenty of knowledge about symptoms. But he had never heard of anything like this. Was it serious? Having never gotten a proper health checkup in his life, he briefly imagined something terrible.

Nothing is happening right this second. It’s only mild dizziness and chills at most, and the symptoms aren’t regular. It’s probably nothing.

Dante shrugged and stood up. Since he was overseas and could not do anything immediately, all he could do for now was hope it improved. Or maybe this was happening because he had gone too long without eating. Now that he thought about it, hypoglycemic symptoms were quite similar to this.

Still unconsciously clutching Rhys’s hoodie tight to his chest, Dante went into the bathroom. Some humidity remained inside, along with the scent of the shower gel Rhys had used first. The smell was pleasant, but it was nothing compared to Rhys’s actual scent.

Dante buried his face briefly in the hoodie and inhaled deeply. After breathing in that faint floral fragrance for several minutes, his condition improved considerably. Only then did he feel ready to shower.

***