Sage looked up into the sky from the window, feeling very lost. In fact, she did not know the answer to
that question either.
Relationships were never easy. The outsider could always see it very clearly and tackle the problem
spot on, but it was the opposite when you were the one facing the problem. Most of the time, your head
would always be a mess.
At night, Jace had a hard time sleeping. To be more accurate, he had not slept soundly for a long time.
He had been restless lately.
Holding on to Sage’s hairpin, he slowly rubbed along with the texture of it and vaguely felt like he was
drifting to another dimension. In the dream, he saw two bodies leaning on each other at the staircase
formed by clouds.
“Sage,” he called out lightly. As Sage turned around to see him, he walked closer to her and thought
Sage was leaning on him. Just then, the man beside Sage suddenly turned around, and that was when
Jace got stunned and stopped walking. It was not him. The face belonged to another man, Yale. That
was when Jace suddenly woke up abruptly with heavy breathing and sweat all over his forehead and
back. His hand was still holding the hairpin, and the sweat on his palms slowly penetrated into the
texture.
He supported his forehead and spaced out for a long time. Then he got up from the bed, lit up a
cigarette and started smoking on the balcony. The smoke from the cigarette slightly covered up the
color of his pupils. There was no light coming out from unit number 88, which was the next-door unit. It
meant that no one was at home. Yale had gone to interrogate Jekyll, and he wondered if Yale would
have any success with the interrogation.
UIT
Meantime, Sage, who was at Birmingham, was also restless. She had been tossing around the bed
and still could not fall asleep. Her phone was in her hand as she awaited an email.
Yale did not use WhutsApp nor liked to call people. He preferred sending an email as a means of
communication. Sage was feeling very nervous as Yale had promised to inform her as soon as he
found out anything from Jekyll. Her mind could not stop thinking if Yale managed to make Jekyll talk
and also if her parents were still alive. She needed to calm herself down as her heart was beating too
fast.
As she got up from the bed, she put a shawl over her shoulder and took out a cigarette from the side
table. Using the lighter, she lit up the cigarette and let it burn slowly. Occasionally taking a puff to ease
her anxious heart.
She could not remember when she learned how to smoke. Roughly, it was after the time of her parents’
accident. During that period, she had to investigate the truth of their death and also took control of the
family business. It was a dark and stressful time for her. Her responsibilities were too heavy that they
almost suffocated her.
Sage was still a normal human being, she was not as strong as everyone thought she was. The strong
outer layer was just an armor to show everyone, and only she knew how fragile her heart was and how
lonely she felt.
Just like many women, she longed for family, longed for friendship, longed for love, and, most
importantly, she longed for companionship. Her soul seemed to fail to find a place to call home, to
settle down. It was like she was all alone in this world. She did not like that feeling at
After standing by the window for a long time, her cigarette was fully burnt, turning into ashes.
There were finally lights coming out from unit 88. Jace raised his head immediately.
Sage’s phone finally rang, and she quickly looked at it.
Jace walked out of his room.
Sage took her phone and clicked open her mailbox. A short sentence appeared, and she was shocked.
She strode out of her room. “Tim!”
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