Chapter 6：Once upon a time

"A story?" Anna was very much curious to know what kind of story Alex would share with her. He was an odd kind of person to begin with, so she imagined that anything he had to share would be interesting. "What kind of story?"

"An old one. It's not quite finished yet, though." Alex answered her. His mouth curved up at the sides and his eyes weren't quite dancing.

"Alright," Anna was in a lazy, indulgent kind of mood. She didn't feel the need to be up and buzzing about like she normally did. Whether this was the result of this week's worth of pampering or her own coming to terms with things, she didn't know.

"Once, a very, very long time ago," Alex began, "There was a young woman from a poor family. Her father was a woodcutter and her mother wove cloth. Their earnings weren't meager, but they were a long way from exceptional. Most years, they only just made enough to last through the winter."

"One day, the young woman fell in love with a kind young man. He'd helped her gather up the firewood she'd accidentally toppled from the cart she was using to take it all into town. As he, too, was going into town, they chatted along the way, exchanging their names and speaking of small, simple things, the kinds of things one talks about when meeting someone for the first time.

"They promised to meet again when they separated at the town, eager to continue their conversation. And they met again and again. The young woman fell deeper and deeper in love with this easy to understand and comfortable person, but he did not fall in love with her. Still, he enjoyed her attentions and her genuine attentions. He thought her a sweet young woman, kind and obedient, hardworking and soft spoken. He was the son of a wealthy merchant and had met many other girls, but found them to be frivolous and petty, interested in shallow things. He did not love the young woman, but what he felt was close enough to it that he mistook it for love."

"He married her, didn't he?" Anna guessed.

"He did," Alex nodded. "They lived in a small home together and were happy for a time, but it wasn't fated to last. He was foolish. He had chosen a wife perfectly capable of tending to his home and needs, cooking him delicious meals and doing his laundry without complaint."

"But?" Anna prodded for the next part of the story.

"But his affection for her didn't last. He began to find faults in her that he hadn't seen before, criticizing the simple, sensible clothing he'd once chosen her for and announcing the imperfections he found in her appearance. These were only small things that would not normally matter to either of them, but they began to add up over time. His dissatisfaction turned into cruelty.

"She endured, always smiling at him while she placed his favorite foods before him and neatly folded his clothing. Sometimes her hands shook when she laid out his outfits, aware that he was going to spend his time with another woman, but she never spoke against him. No longer content with what he had, he began to spend more and more time out of his home, carousing through brothels and taverns. She became the laughingstock of the whole town, but his cruelty didn't cease.

"He began to bring his favorite lovers home, demanding his wife prepare enough dinner to serve all three of them before taking his pretty women to their marriage bed. She would go outside on those nights, finding somewhere else to sleep. He never knew where she went, because he'd never considered that she had no place to sleep when he'd taken someone else to bed.

"He was foolish and immature and one day, he carelessly told her that he would be happier without her. Heartbroken, she took him at his word and left. She disappeared one day and he never saw her again.

"At first, the fool was pleased with his sudden new fortune, glad to be free again. He wasn't smart enough to understand what he had carelessly thrown away. He married a pretty young woman suggested by his parents, but found no happiness in her. He divorced her. He married another woman and though their relationship lasted longer, he divorced her, too. No one would marry him after that, not even for his money. He gave up on marriage because no one would accept him for himself anymore.

"He had made his wife the laughingstock of town, but when she disappeared, he became the brute of it. Who other than a brute could find it in them to chase away a woman who loved him so much to endure everything that would make him happy? Who other than a brute could be so cruel?

"He came to realize that he'd never actually given her the fullness of his heart and became full of regret. He questioned whether he even deserved to after how he had treated her and began to look for her. His neighbors had not seen her and neither had her parents. He looked for her for years and years, journeying from place to place in his attempts to find her. He found riches and artifacts as he searched, gained magical powers and more in his travels, but even so, he never found her."

Alex paused, a wry smile sliding across his face, and then asked, "What do you think?"

"She was a fool for marrying someone she knew didn't love her," Anna said bluntly, arms crossed. She was tapping her right index finger against her left arm.

Surprised by her response, Alex asked her, "What makes you think she knew?"

Anna gaped at him before shaking her head. "If she truly loved him, suffering quietly through all of that, waiting and hoping for him to be happy, then she absolutely knew that he never loved her because he made it clear that she was never enough. She was foolish."

"Then what do you think happened?" he questioned her.

"She died."

"You're right, of course," Alex said ruefully. "But that man never stopped looking."

"He was foolish, too," she told him, shaking her head. "Because she loved him and she wanted him to be happy. She wanted him to be happy at the cost of everything she had. He should have forgotten about her and moved on, he should have tried harder to be happy."

At that, Alex frowned. "But what if he were to find her again?"

She kept shaking her head at him and then sighed. "I hope, for her sake, that he never does," she said. "Because I can't even begin to imagine how painful it would be for her to know that she's always being compared to this imagined, false version of her perfection that he's created in his own mind and placed upon a pedestal."

The sides of his mouth turned down even more at her words, but his expression had become thoughtful. "Do you think he would do that?"

"She's become untouchable and precious by being unobtainable," Anna pointed out. "Because he drove her away so thoroughly, he could never get her back. That ruined his next marriages. He never forgot her and his mind lingered on her. Even when he thought he could be happy, there was a part of him that would not allow it because he felt guilty. That's why he gave up on getting married again. He'd given up on love."

"Do you really think he gave up on love?" Alex asked her. "He looked for her."

She shook her head at him again. "He looked for what he thought she was. When someone comes into your life and gives you all of the kindness you begin to take for granted and then you hurt that person, they become a victim the moment you regret your actions. She disappeared and so he never found absolution. In his heart, he's looking for her so he can beg for her forgiveness and hoping for her love."

"Doesn't he deserve it if he's spent the rest of his life looking for her?"

Anna gave him a pitying look. "It's not up to him. It's up to her. She would probably have forgiven him because she was foolish enough to have died for him, but I don't think either of us can speak to whether or not he would deserve forgiveness or love. Neither of those things are something anyone can claim to deserve."

He seemed puzzled, so she further explained, "Forgiveness and love aren't earned. They're freely given, so it's not possible for anyone to say they are owed either."

"Then, in your opinion, what should he do?"

She shrugged. "I already said, didn't I? He should forget about her. He messed up. He lost her and he couldn't get her back. He has to accept the consequences of what he did and move on with his life. Imagine if she were a ghost or something looking after him - do you think she would've been happy with his misery? He told her he'd be happier with her gone and yet he seemed to find only more dissatisfaction. How do you think she would feel?"

"Like it was well-deserved?" Alex tried. He was trying to approach the question from an angle opposite his previous white lotus perception of the woman.

"She would be miserable," Anna said simply. "Because she died for his happiness, but she would think that even her death wasn't enough for him to be happy. Because she loved him and knew him, she would be aware that he was held back by that sliver of regret."

"If she knew him so well, why did she die, then?" Alex asked, perturbed.

"She died because she couldn't live anymore," Anna said quietly. "At the end of her life, she was heartbroken. Up to that point, he'd been abusive and cruel, but he'd never told her to cease living. At that point, she could no longer pretend that she was alright. She could no longer pretend to be happy and make herself smile at him. The real reason that she left was that she didn't want him to see what he had done to her. She fell in love with his kindness at the very beginning. This woman knew that he would be miserable if he ever came face to face with what he had done."

"Oh," Alex said, his expression one of understanding. His face turned sorrowful as he empathized with the story. "Then she disappeared so there would be no trace of her death."