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Chapter 52 - Picking Stone For Another

Music Recommendation: Vanishing Haze

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Julie sat on the chair, watching Roman who laid on her bed with his eyes closed. She was unsure if he had closed his eyes just to relax or if he had really fallen asleep. After he had tried to intimidate her, she had moved to sit on the chair, where she quietly watched him.

"Roman?" Julie called his name, but receiving no response from him, she believed that he had indeed fallen asleep.

But after five seconds passed, Roman asked her, "What is it?"

"I thought you fell asleep," she murmured to herself. Seeing him not reply to it, she asked, "You seem to love this dorm. Did you have many fond memories while you were staying here during your initial years in Veteris?"

Earlier when he had glared at her, Julie knew that if she hadn\'t exchanged letters with Roman, she would have probably fainted because of the intense pressure she felt. With their continuous exchange of conversation that took place in the letters and during the time he tutored her, Julie felt as if she had been able to get a glimpse through his exterior surface. It wasn\'t much, but it was more than what others who were living in Veteris had seen.

At Julie\'s question, Roman opened his eyes to reveal his red eyes that the human girl couldn\'t see from where she sat. He stared at the ceiling that was made out of wood.

"Fond memories," Roman repeated Julie\'s words as he was questioned about it. "There are many of them. Though it would be a stretch to call all of them to be fond memories," he hummed.

Julie, who heard this wondered what Roman meant by his words. She said, "I don\'t think anything ever holds to be a completely good memory. Everything relates to some good and some bad."

"True, looks like you have some experience," said Roman, a small smile broke through his lips that didn\'t quite reach his eyes, and it disappeared from his lips within seconds. "You see Winters, this dorm isn\'t just a space of four closed walls. It was more than that when I came to live here."

"Will you tell me more about it?" asked Julie, curious to know what went through Roman\'s mind and what kind of memories he had preserved in this room, which had now turned into a temporary home for her until she was here in Veteris.

Roman\'s eyes flickered from red to change back into the shiny black eyes. He shifted his gaze from the ceiling to look at where Julie was sitting, her brown eyes reminding him of a guarded rabbit that sat still so that it wouldn\'t alert its predator.

When it came to people, he liked to keep his distance. He had always liked it that way, to have people leave him alone. And it was very unlike him, to be coming by this room that once belonged to him. What had started as his amusement had now turned into an intrigue with both of them.

"If I tell you… I will have to kill you," hearing Roman\'s words, Julie gulped.

She didn\'t understand why he enjoyed scaring people, and she wondered if it was because he was a bully, someone who lived on people\'s fear and their discomfort. But Julie didn\'t forget the times when Roman had saved her, which is why she doubted he was a bully.

There was something very distinctive about Roman Moltenore. No matter where he was, he always stood out from the rest of the people. She wasn\'t sure if it was because of his attire or the disinterested look that he wore on his face.

The exchange of letters between them had turned her slightly brave towards him and she asked him, "Is it a confidential secret that cannot be shared?"

"Look at you fishing to know something about me," remarked Roman, his gaze unwaveringly looking at her. He then said, "If I didn\'t know you better, I would have believed that you are trying to gain my attention, Winters."

Julie pursed her lips before she said, "I have already told you that you aren\'t my type," she lifted her chin up and looked at the other side of the room.

"I haven\'t forgotten your boring type, Winters. Looks like you and the Mcoy boy have been spending quite some time together," Roman sat up on the bed, his hands placed on the surface of the bed on either side of his body.

"We are just friends and why do you care?" asked Julie, she knitted her eyebrows together while giving him a look.

Roman tilted his head to the side while supporting himself with his hands. "I worry for you," his words hit something in her chest and she quickly brushed it away.

"You don\'t have to," Julie replied, her toes curling and uncurling on the floor, where she felt the cold floor beneath her feet.

As if Roman was not done with his sentence, he said, "I worry that you will catch his stupidity. It is only going to dull down on what I have taught you so far. Did you forget about me mentioning that stupidity is infectious?"

Julie lightly glared at the rude boy, "Are you always like this? Taunting people?"

"Most of the time. Don\'t expect anything less," came the reply from Roman.

She noticed him pick her notebook, tearing the sheet before having the gum that he had been chewing until now wrap itself around the paper. Roman pushed himself to stand up and looked around the room as if he was looking for something. He asked her, "Do you have something to eat?"

Julie walked to her cupboard, and pulled out the bottom drawers. She had stashed five potato chips with different flavours so that she could have something to eat at night. She proudly presented them to him before asking, "Which one would you like to have?"

"All of them."

In less than ten minutes, Roman finished all of them leaving not a single potato chip in it. Julie\'s mouth was left hanging because she hadn\'t expected him to have such an appetite.

"Why are you staring?" questioned Roman. "Did you want some?"

He... He was asking her after he finished everything!

"Have you not eaten anything since this morning?" Julie asked, with surprise on her face.

Roman rolled his eyes, "I did, but you know how it is. A young man needs to eat as much as he can, else you never know what might happen," and he handed her the empty packets. "You should buy those cream onion flavoured ones, they taste better than the salted ones." He went back to lie down on the bed, and he said, "Are you not going to sleep, or have you decided to stare at me the whole night?"

"I am not used to having someone in the room," said Julie. The way Roman had said earlier, it was as if she was waiting to pounce on him. How scandalous! She thought in her mind.

"Close your eyes and imagine that I am not here. Don\'t you have a sibling who shared the same room before coming here?" he questioned, while stretching his body on the bed, while taking the entire space.

Julie shook her head, "No. It was only when I was at Uncle Thomas\' house. What about you?"

Roman turned his head from where he had laid, and he asked her, "About sharing rooms with girls? No. When I am done with them, I usually have them out of the room. And also, it is better I go to their room than they come to mine."

So he was just someone who liked his space and didn\'t like sharing it, thought Julie in her mind.

"I meant if you have a sibling," even though his eyes were black, Julie noticed a flicker in them, when she questioned. "If you don\'t want to answer, that is fine," she added. As curious as she was, she didn\'t want to intrude in others\' private lives.

"Taking back your question because you know I will ask you the same?" Roman hit right on the nail and Julie wondered if he read people like his books.

"Maybe," Julie answered truthfully and Roman chuckled.

"How interesting," he hummed, and went back to staring at the ceiling of the dorm. His eyes traced every line and carving on it. Without the human\'s things that crowded the room and the wall that had been built to shorten and give one more room, the place felt the same as before to Roman. "I had a sibling, an older one," he replied to Julie\'s question. "His name was Tristan and he was nearly four years older to me. He passed away with the other members of my family."

"I am sorry to hear that," said Julie. Roman didn\'t seem fazed when he said it. As if it had been a long time, since it had happened and the memories of it had faded over time. "It must have been nice… to have a sibling."

"It was," responded Roman, his eyes turning to have a distant look in them.

When Roman had been brought to this mansion for the very first time, that belonged to Malcolm Moltenore, his wife Pertonille had been furious. It was also the same time when he met his half-brother Tristan, who was older to him and even taller. After his father and his father\'s wife had come to an agreement, the mansion\'s butler had led him to this very same room.

Roman closed his eyes, the memories of the past starting to slowly slip into his mind…

The little boy with dark hair sat on the edge of the cot that had been arranged for him in the room upon the decision taken by the Moltenore\'s family that he was going to live here from now on. He sat there in the room all alone, with the room\'s door closed as if the other people of the mansion were trying to hide him.

Placing his foot down on the ground, the little boy went to the door and tried to pull the handle, but it seemed like the room was locked. It was only his first day here, and he wanted to go back to the place from where he had come.

The little boy climbed up and reached the window, opening it for fresh air to come in. The window had no grills to stop him. He leaned forward, looking at the blanket of grass that had spread on the ground below the window. While the little boy continued to stare at it, the room\'s door opened, and he turned around to catch sight of a brown-haired boy who appeared to be older than him.

"Master Tristian, you shouldn\'t enter the room," said the butler, coming to stand behind the boy.

"Everybody in the mansion has been speaking about him. I wanted to meet him too," said the boy named Tristan while looking at the little boy who looked barely six or seven years old.

"Lady Pertonille told me to keep this room closed. I don\'t think she would like it if she were to come to know that you are hovering near this room where the boy is," informed the butler.

The little boy stared in the direction where the two people stood right outside the door. When the butler pulled the door back to close it, the little boy had an expression of indifference on his face, and he went back to look at the grass.

During his initial stay in the mansion, the servants and the other people except for Mr. Moltenore steered clear of him. Leaving him by himself, where no one came to talk or greet him.

One day, when the family members were riding the carriage to attend a tea party, Lord Malcolm had taken little Roman along with him. During the entire ride, Lady Pertonille was angry at her husband because he had decided to show and introduce his illegitimate son to everyone.

"You cannot expect to hide him forever behind a room, Pertonille. As much as you hate it, he is now part of the Moltenore family," Mr. Moltenore tried to pacify and calm down his wife.

"I had agreed to allow him to have the same roof as us out of pity and here again you? decide to cross the line. Why do you want to embarass me like this in front of everyone, Malcolm? What have I done to you?" whispered the lady with a frown coming to settle on her face.

She was whispering because both the two young boys were sitting in front of them in the carriage. As much as the woman didn\'t like to be reminded of her husband\'s affair with another woman, she still had the decency to not shout in the carriage and let the children hear it.

Mr. Moltenore placed his hand on his wife\'s hand as if to calm her. "Forgive me, Pertonille," he said, looking at her. "I don\'t want people to talk behind our back, and would rather like to officially introduce him to everyone."

The woman turned to look at the small boy, who had been staring outside the carriage\'s window. A sigh escaped her lips, and she nodded her head.

"But I won\'t be there to support you by your side, when you make the announcement. Both Tristian and I don\'t want to witness that," Petronile shook her head.

"Okay," her husband nodded his head in agreement, satisfied with her words.

After attending the day of the soiree, word had spread far about Malcolm Moltenore having another child, an illegitimate son.

Two years passed, and nothing much had changed in the life of the younger son of Malcolm Moltenore. One afternoon, Roman was walking outside the big mansion, and he caught sight of Tristan, arguing with another boy.

Noticing a sudden fight break in between the two boys, where it seemed like Tristan was on the ground going to get hit by the other boy. Young Roman quickly went to where they were and bit right into the other boy\'s leg. The other boy screamed and fell, freeing Roman\'s half-brother.

"AHH!" the other boy screamed, noticing blood drip down from his leg. "What is wrong with him?!"

Tristan was surprised to see that Roman had come to his aid. Because from what he had noticed his half-brother often liked to keep himself away from people and didn\'t like company. The other boy, who was of his own age, went to hit the younger boy, but Roman used his nails to dig into his bare leg, as the boy wore knee length pant.

"Get this bastard away from me!" The other boy pushed Roman away from him, ready to smack him, but Tristan came in between them. Catching hold of the boy\'s arm, Tristan pushed him away from Roman and him.

"Stay away from him, Griffin," Tristan warned the boy. "He\'s my brother."

The boy glared at both Roman for biting his leg, and at the same time, young Roman picked up a stone from the ground with his expression passive.

"Crazy family!" the boy shouted before leaving the brothers to themselves.

Tristan turned to look at Roman, "That was unexpected from you."

"You know to fight," said Roman, dropping the stone as if, if Tristan knew how to defend himself, he wouldn\'t have intervened. He turned around, starting to head back towards the mansion. "Where are you going?"

"Mansion," came the dull response from the younger one. Tristan caught up with him, walking next to him with a gentle smile on his lips.

"He\'s not going to stay quiet about it. You didn\'t have to do that, you know," said Tristan.

Roman didn\'t speak the entire way, but his half-brother seemed more than happy to accompany him back to the mansion. When they came near the mansion, he stopped and turned to say, "You lied."

"About what?" The older boy turned perplexed.

"About me being your brother," said Roman, staring at Tristan.

"Because we are, aren\'t we?"