I Watched My Friend Get Disfigured

When I reopened my eyes, I found that I had returned to the past.

This time, when Hedgar stormed off, I chose to stay back and continue eating.

I still remembered how she constantly mocked me in my previous life.

“If you hadn’t been such a nosy fool and saved me, we might both be perfectly fine right now.”

The wheels of destiny spun by the book.

While I was marveling over how things had changed, I heard pained moaning from the ICU.

After Hedgar woke up, she could not accept that her beautiful face was ruined.

“Don’t touch your wounds, Hedgar! The doctor said that you were severely burned. It’s a miracle that you survived.”

Hedgar wanted to touch her face with a trembling hand, but her parents grabbed it tightly.

Even so, she still wanted to see a mirror as she mumbled, “This can’t be real. It’s just a small wound. I can’t have scars on my face.”

Irene turned around and cried silently.

Complicated emotions stirred in me.

Irene had treated me like her own son and always cared for me in my previous life.

As I watched her, I could not help hating that she gave birth to such a selfish daughter.

I walked over to call for a nurse to pacify Hedgar, but she glared at me with hate. “Get lost! I’m fine! Stop pretending to care!”

A nurse wanted to convince Hedgar to not look at her face just yet, but I stopped her.

Our roles had changed, and it was my turn to watch her struggle in pain.

After our wedding, Hedgar became certain that I rushed into the fire to save her in order to guilt trip her into marrying me. From then on, she hated me to the very core.

Once, when my scars got infected so badly that I could not sleep due to the pain, I got up to grab my medicine, only to find that she had locked me in my room.

I was sweating from the pain. When I looked up, I saw her staring at me coldly from behind the door.

From that moment on, the disappointment in my heart killed all the love I had for her.

Just then, a voice cut through my musings.

“Hedgar, don’t do this. Can’t you just rest and recover? Please?”

As I watched Irene tremble, I sighed.

…

“Hedgar, your wounds are going through acute inflammation right now. If you don’t take care of them properly, your dermis will go through hyperplasia, and it’ll lead to your scar tissue becoming thick and tough.”

The nurse stared at me in puzzlement. She was clearly wondering why I knew this so well.

I had gone through this pain before.

Every second of it was etched into my bones.

I no longer wanted to have anything to do with Hedgar.

But my mother insisted on me taking care of her, since we were neighbors for years.

When I changed her dressing, the smell of disinfectant and medicine wafted into my nose.

I could not help it and stepped back. Meanwhile, Hedgar bit her lip.

She was so egotistical. What was going to happen to her in the future?

While driving home, I asked, “Why hasn’t the man who got you hurt visited you?”

At the mention of him, Hedgar’s parents’s mood soured. After all, the man had left Hedgar in the fire and ran away on his own.

I could see Hedgar’s eyes growing dull in the rearview mirror.

After a long while, she said coldly, “Leon said that he’s busy and will visit me in a few days.”

I knew her all too well.

She was prideful to a fault.

Irene wanted to say something, but James Stane, Hedgar’s father, tugged her shirt.

But I insisted on rubbing salt over Hedgar’s wound and said to Irene, “Let her meet whoever she wants. After being hurt like this, it may help to see the man she likes to feel better.”

I had no other wish but for Hedgar and Leon Cooper, that man she liked, to bother each other forever and stop hurting other people.

Irene still wanted to say something, but in the end, she chose to remain silent.

How could I not know what was on her mind?

I grew up with Hedgar, so our parents always thought that we would end up getting married.

Speaking of how I felt toward Hedgar…

After some thinking, I found that I could no longer remember when I had fallen in love with her.

As for when that love disappeared…

Perhaps it was when she, for Leon’s sake, told everyone that I was the one who kept pestering her.

Or perhaps it was when she forgot my birthday so that she could keep Leon company.

At present, she was just a stranger to me.

I would not look for revenge, but I would also no longer be a part of her life.

Hopefully, she would spend the rest of her life with Leon.