⊱Garde la tête haute⊰

Keep your head up

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"Such a thing is possible?"

Lucy nodded to Envy as the latter stared off into the distance. Even I needed some time to sink all the information thrown our way. This was my last card. If I failed now, I would have to face my end with no resistance.

I should have at least told the Virtues about this before coming here in haste.

"I consider your silence as acceptance to search the past," God announced as the four of us sat around the meeting table. "Where do you want to start?"

I thought about it for a moment and nodded to myself before giving my answer. Envy still stayed silent.

"Very well." God nodded before Lucy and him stood up. "Remember, you'll be in a mix of illusion and reality. It will be like watching a movie."

"Close your eyes," Lucy ordered and I did as told, my rapid heartbeat being the only thing I could feel.

Gusts of wind blew past me as my surroundings seemed to shift. My throat dried up and I had to swallow the impending fear while keeping my eyes shut.

"Taehyung!"

My eyes snapped open when I heard my own voice, and I found myself in a school hallway. Not just any school hallway. It was my own high school.

Everything felt real.

The sunlight through the windows, the footsteps vibrating against the wooden floor, the loud chatters of students, and the air I could breathe freely. It was all real.

And when I whipped my head around, I was standing there in my school uniform. My hair was black, flowing down my shoulders, my forehead covered with my fringes, and my dark eyes filled with curiosity. The me from the past... She was real. Realer than I imagined.

Looking around, I saw Envy staring at her with wide eyes. And looking further away, I stopped breathing when my eyes fell on him.

He looked just the same as I remembered, just the same as the painting. The younger version of him right now.

I lifted my hand to touch him, but I remembered that I couldn't. This was just a memory. An illusion.

My younger version walked past me and faced him as he looked at her apathetically. Memories washed over me where Taehyung used to ignore my advances to become his friend any chance I got.

Envy seemed to have frozen in place, unable to take his eyes off the two.

"What did you want?"

Taehyung's soft voice snapped my head towards him. My own chuckle followed and the girl before me presented him the pink box in her hand.

"My father tried making some macarons, but he ended up making too many, so I'm handing out some to my classmates."

God was right. It was just like a movie. The one of which I knew the lines to, slipping in and out of my mind.

My lips tugged upwards when Taehyung took the box of macarons before mumbling, "thank you".

"You're very welcome," I whispered at the same time as my younger self chimed the words.

After they parted, they were suppressing their growing smiles. A dull ache tugged my chest at the sight.

These were the times.

No tears, no misfortunes, no lies.

If I could go back to this time, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

Envy had been unusually quiet since we arrived that it was worrying me. Coming back to face the past must had been difficult, scary even. I could only imagine what was going on in his head after seeing himself like that.

Clearing my throat, I did what came to mind first.

"Do you think this past is distorted in some way? Your face looks way better than reality. I mean," I drawled, scanning his surprised face with a frown, uncertainty and disappointment. "Your real face is... you know...?"

"Hey!" He squeaked out, pointing at me with a huff. "Speak for yourself! I don't remember you looking like this. It's like they slapped some filter on you!"

I scoffed in disbelief. He didn't have to put it like that.

Our surroundings shifted again and we found ourselves outside the school, somewhere down the streets I used to stroll. I was remembering fragments of my human life from the faintest glimmer of my memories that had faded throughout the years in heaven.

Nostalgia was mercilessly pouring down on me, drenching me in its blues.

"There," Envy exclaimed, catching my attention, and I looked at the direction he was pointing to find our younger selves walking side by side.

Or rather, I was desperately trying to catch up to him while he was speed walking to get away from me.

Why was I so hung up on him before? I was always trying to befriend him while he constantly made it clear that he didn't want to associate himself with anyone else, let alone me.

What if he wouldn't have become a deadly sin if I just stopped running after him?

"Are you tired? I was dozing off because of Mr. Jang's speech in History, gosh! It was so boring," my younger self exclaimed, trying to engage in a conversation with Taehyung who gave up on outrunning. "What's your favorite subject, by the way? Is it Literature?"

"I like Art, actually," he said, widening her eyes.

"Really? I love Art, too. We'll get along just fine." She smiled at him to which he shook his head, continuing to look at the ground while walking.

Envy and I followed them, listening to the small talks and my blabbering in silence as they walked to the bus stop. My younger self stole glances at Taehyung from time to time, but he never looked up at her.

I held my breath when she suddenly reached her hand to grip his chin and lifted it up to make him face her in surprise.

"W-What-"

"You're always looking down at the ground wherever you go. As if you committed a crime or something. You didn't, did you?"

Taehyung frowned, stopping in his tracks, making all of us to stop, too. "Of course not."

"Then stop acting like you're guilty all the time if you didn't do anything wrong. Look." She lifted his face up higher to the sky above with a smile. "You won't find beauty like that if you keep your eyes on the ground."

I followed their gazes and looked up at the twilight sky. My safe haven. Myriads of exotic colors overlapped each other, gracing the evening with their beauty.

When I looked back, Taehyung seemed to be captivated by the sky as if actually seeing it for the first time. Perhaps it was.

My younger self smiled at him when their eyes met and gestured him to keep walking. He stared at her for a while before following, and the bus stop was just around the corner.

I didn't use to catch a bus from there. My bus never stopped there but I used to walk here just to spend more time with Taehyung in hopes of getting closer to him.

What a fool... Walking all the way here just to be with him.

The two stood there in silence for a while, waiting for his bus to arrive. It seemed like Taehyung had an invisible shield or barrier around himself.

"These other people aren't suitable," Envy spoke, startling me, and I just realized there were others there at the bus stop as well.

I nearly forgot why we were there in the first place.

"Yeah... I'm sure we'll see many other people," I said, watching the memory of myself struggling to start another conversation.

Taehyung, on the other hand, had his eyes fixed at the sunset in the horizon, rarely looking down at the ground.

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