Chapter 111: It seems that love is like the weather.

Violet felt refreshed—truly, deeply so.

The longstanding rift with Claudia, the dissonance with Yuran—both had finally been resolved.

It was a sensation she hadn’t felt in ages…… perhaps never before.

The weight that had always pressed down on her shoulders seemed to lift away; her body felt strangely light.

She had carried burdens of every kind since the day she was born, so perhaps her senses had simply grown warped.

Surely this was only a tiny thing.

Something trivial, hardly worth mentioning.

And yet—to Violet—it was something immensely, profoundly important.

“Welcome home, my lady.”

“I’m back. Did I keep you waiting too long?”

Violet glanced at Marlin’s expression as the latter greeted her slightly later return than usual.

She often came home late anyway, but being even a little later than that tended to worry people.

She always made it in time for dinner, so there shouldn’t be any other cause for concern—yet in this household, the unreasonable rule that Violet alone would be scolded for an uncommunicated change of plans still held firm.

“It’s perfectly all right. Shall I prepare right away?”

“Yes…… there isn’t much time before dinner, is there?”

“There’s plenty of time for you to get ready, though I’m afraid you won’t be able to rest for very long.”

“Then let’s do that. Once I sit down, I might lose the will to move.”

“Understood.”

The moment she entered her room, Violet changed clothes and sat before the mirror to tidy her appearance.

It was only a simple task—brushing out hair tousled by the wind—but neglecting it would only invite criticism later.

Honestly, looking in the mirror had never been something Violet enjoyed.

She had hated confirming her own appearance ever since her mother was alive; that aversion had only worsened with time, fed by the vulgar gazes that followed her as she grew older.

The very act of self-inspection felt no different from self-harm when she couldn’t accept her reflection kindly to begin with.

Even now, that fundamental awareness hadn’t truly changed.

She simply looked in the mirror far more often than before—and paid far more attention to her appearance.

Whether that was good or bad, she couldn’t say.

“……!”

The brush gliding through her hair caught on something at the ends.

A faint tug at her scalp made her pause; when she checked, she found a small, tangled knot of frizzy strands.

Perhaps because of her natural hair texture, no matter how careful she was, tangles always formed.

As a child her hair had been smooth and straight, but as she grew it began to form gentle waves.

Whether that was due to age or because she had started letting it grow long, she didn’t know—but she had no intention of cutting it short again, so the cause hardly mattered.

“It’s grown quite a bit, hasn’t it.”

“I haven’t cut it at all except for maintenance since I started growing it out.”

“Five years…… six, perhaps?”

“Yes. It began around the time I came to serve you.”

“How nostalgic.”

Back then her hair had never grown past her shoulders.

While girls her age proudly showed off cute, carefully styled looks, Violet had always gone out into society with hair that had simply been chopped short.

Remembering it now made her feel beyond embarrassment—straight into disbelief.

Even if she hadn’t had the luxury to care at the time, she wondered how her father had ever taken such a child anywhere.

He must have truly not cared at all.

Perhaps she should be grateful he at least provided dresses.

“The ends are starting to look damaged too…… they’re terribly dry.”

On the surface the strands still held a glossy sheen, but touching them revealed the lack of moisture.

Not quite rough, yet the texture felt somehow coarse and bothersome.

Even with Marlin’s attentive care, maintaining beauty was difficult if Violet herself paid it no mind.

Here and there the hair was parched; up close, short stray hairs stuck out in every direction.

It was only noticeable when she touched it or looked closely—strangers passing by would never notice.

Suddenly, she remembered a face.

Someone who had touched this hair from this distance—or even closer.

“……!”

“Violet-sama?”

In an instant heat rushed to her face.

The usual pallor—even paleness—vanished as vivid color bloomed across Violet’s cheeks.

Emotions she had never felt before, things she had never cared about, swirled inside her, bringing an overwhelming wave of shame.

She wanted to press her face into the hair she had just been touching, to hide from some invisible gaze.

Marlin’s concerned hand touched her back, but Violet suspected the reason was completely different from whatever Marlin imagined.

（Yuran definitely noticed, didn’t he.）

It was far, far too late for such thoughts—absurdly late—but the simple fact that he had seen her like this weighed heavily on her shoulders.

It wasn’t pain or sadness or any negative feeling.

Precisely because it wasn’t, the pure, unadulterated embarrassment boiled through her entire body.

She knew he wasn’t the sort of person who cared about appearances.

Compared to everything she had already shown him, the state of her hair was laughably trivial.

And yet—love was such a strange thing.

Just as she wanted him to see every weakness, every flaw, and accept them all—

She also wanted him to see only perfection.

She wanted him to notice even the tiniest imperfection.

Things she could normally compromise on, things she wouldn’t even have noticed—once viewed through the lens of love, they became catastrophic defects.

She found herself thinking: What if this alone makes him disillusioned?

“Marlin, I have a request.”

“Yes, what is it?”

“……Starting today, I’d like special care.”

“…………”

Violet buried her face in her own hair ends.

Her gaze—usually fixed straight on Marlin when making a request—remained pinned downward.

Through the curtain of strands, the bright red of her cheeks was plainly visible even to Marlin.

But if Marlin pressed the issue, Violet would probably try to handle it herself.

Marlin wasn’t the sort to refuse a rare request from her mistress.

“Of course. It seems the time has finally come for my carefully selected collection of care products to shine.”

“You were collecting them?”

“I held back because Violet-sama has never been very proactive about such things…… but it appears patience is no longer necessary.”

“……Please go easy on me.”

“Yes. I’m certain you’ll be delighted with the results.”

“That’s not what I meant……”

Polishing her beautiful mistress to even greater heights was a joyous change for Marlin.

Violet had once seemed to resent even her own beauty—had seemed to find it burdensome.

She had never demanded more than basic cleanliness.

Anything beyond the bare minimum risked adding to Violet’s burdens instead of easing them.

So Marlin had endured—patiently—for a very long time.

She had endured the fact that Violet’s beauty was never properly recognized.

She had endured the fact that Violet herself had given up on it.

Such radiance, yet people feared its sharpness.

Violet’s true beauty was so much more than this.

What the world shrank from was still only the rough stone.

If Violet herself desired it—then there was no longer any need to hold back.

“I’ll make you more beautiful than anyone else.”

“Thank you. That’s reassuring.”

She was glad for this change.

It was a little lonely that she herself hadn’t been the one to bring it about.

But for now—for whose sake Violet desired that beauty—Marlin pretended not to know.