She tried to say something, but her throat burned, her heartbeat stumbled, her words dissolved into breath. Lucien didn’t wait for a response. He pulled his—hand back stood slowly, the breeze tousled his hair across his forehead.
You know, he stopped, his back to her. There are some things you can only see, Mars, without your eyes. Then he walked away, leaving Valeria alone with the last trace of sunlight, and a heart beginning to tremble with something that felt dangerously close to breaking free.
Lucien didn’t go back inside right away. He stood beneath the awning for a while, his back still turned, as if weighing something, whether to speak or carry the thought with him forever. At last he spoke, quietly, slowly, but enough to stop Valeria’s breath.
Tomorrow I’m going to the hospital. She looked up, startled. He turned slightly, not quite facing her, but his voice was bare, without armour.
There’s a doctor in Switzerland, an experimental procedure, they say the odds aren’t great, but—there’s hope. Valeria opened, her mouth but no words came, no blessing, no protest, because anything she said now would cut both ways. Lucien bowed his head, his hands buried in his coat-pockets.
You know what scares me most? He said, his tone soft with something deeper than fear. It’s not that it might not work. He paused, then gave a faint, almost bitter smile.
It’s that I might open my eyes, and no longer recognise the world I used to think was beautiful, because—it turns out it wasn’t what I imagined. Then he walked into the dark, leaving Valeria frozen on the porch, the wind crept across her shoulders, cold and sharp, whispering one quiet, devastating question. If he sees tomorrow, will he ever want to look at her again? Time after the surgery passed as slowly as pages in a book no one was turning.
Valeria didn’t ask much, Lucien didn’t offer. She remained by his side every day, like part of the house itself. She smiled less, stayed silent more, because the closer they got to the day he might see again, the more terrified she became of what that would mean.
And then that morning came. A morning touched by soft sunlight, birds chirping at the window, and a pair of—eyes about to open after two years of darkness. The sky was unusually clear, as if it too held its breath, waiting for something monumental to unfold.
The recovery room glowed white, quiet, with machines humming in the background like a soft warning. No, one spoke loudly. No one rushed, the air was compressed like the hush before a storm.
Valeria sat beside the bed, hands clasped in her lap, cold and tight. Today the doctor would remove Lucien’s bandages, the eyes she had once touched with trembling fingers, the eyes she once wished could see her first, but now that wish made it hard to breathe. No Celeste make-up, no Dior perfume, no silk dress, just Valeria, plain, bare, real, a woman sitting on the edge of truth, about to lose everything she never meant to love.
Lucien lay still, the final layers of gauze were removed, he kept his eyes closed a moment longer, then blinked as if testing a part of himself that had long been asleep, and then he opened them. Light poured in, fierce, immediate, but he didn’t flinch, his gaze swept across the room, then stopped. Directly in front of him was her, Valeria, froze, her breath caught in her throat, she couldn’t move, couldn’t blink, her heart thudded wildly, her chest ached from the weight of a hope she dared not hold.
Lucien looked at her, he didn’t squint, he didn’t recoil, he didn’t turn away, he simply looked like he had expected to see her, not with surprise, but recognition. Valeria opened her mouth, but no sound came, only her eyes full of something between fear and love. You’re not Celeste, Lucien said, his voice quiet, measured, like a verdict that had long been deliberated, it wasn’t loud, it wasn’t cruel, but for Valeria it landed like a blow, not to her face, but to the last, fragile, pieces of self-protection she had left, she flinched, stepping back half a pace, hands clenched, lips trembling, any excuse, any explanation.
Suddenly felt hollow, but Lucien didn’t stop, he sat up, eyes never leaving hers, I’ve known her for a long time, from your voice, from the way you set the tea on the left instead of the right, from how you say, I’m sorry, like no one’s ever forgiven you before. Valeria wept, no longer quiet tears, she collapsed into herself, covering her face like a child, her whole body shook, not from shame, but from the fear that maybe, even after everything, she wasn’t worthy of being loved. Why? She choked out, her voice breaking like wet paper, why didn’t you say something sooner, why did you let me keep lying to you? Lucien walked toward her, every step closing the distance between them, and toward the truth they’d both been afraid of.
He stopped, stood before her, lowered himself and gently touched her face, wiping away the bitter tears. Because I was waiting, he said, to see if you could love me as a man, and not just as the final role in your family’s game. Valeria looked up, her eyes met his, eyes newly born into light, still adjusting, still blurred, but warmer than the first sun of spring.
Lucien took a breath, and for the first time, he said her real name, Valeria. He didn’t say it with anger, it wasn’t an accusation, it was a truth, a name stripped of disguise, a word never spoken aloud, now made sacred by the way it left his lips. Valeria broke again, but this time she didn’t hide her face, she let it happen, let him see.
Lucien whispered, I didn’t love you, because you reminded me of someone. I loved you, because you dared. To be different, because you loved me when I had nothing left to offer but blindness and unloneliness.
He pulled her into an embrace, light as thread but tight enough to wrap around a heart just starting to heal. At the doorway Celeste appeared, silent, still, watching everything she could no longer change. Lucien didn’t look at her, he only murmured.
Perhaps, to himself, I was blind but in the dark, I saw you most clearly, and Valeria for the first time in her life didn’t need to be anyone else to be. After the day Lucien opened his eyes, nothing changed in the loud, dramatic way Valeria had imagined. There was no shouting, no grand exit, no announcement of endings, only silence, a heavy, careful kind of silence, like the two of them were walking, across thin ice beneath which lived all the things they hadn’t yet dared to name.
Lucien didn’t push her away, but he didn’t pull her closer either. He remained polite, gentle, just as he always had, except now his eyes could see, and that, more than anything terrified Valeria, she felt seen, but also more exposed than ever before, for a full week. They lived under the same roof, like strangers, who had once loved each other in another life.
They avoided sitting at the same table, avoided walking in the garden at the same time, avoided brushing shoulders when passing in narrow hallways, but avoidance doesn’t last forever. That afternoon the sky was overcast, the back garden smelled of herbs drying, the season beginning to shift. Valeria sat on a wrought-iron chair beside the wilted lavender.
Lucien came outside, slowly, without intent, but still stopped in front of her. They sat across from each other like participants in a quiet meeting, where both knew this might be the final page. Valeria kept her gaze low.
Her voice was hoarse, not from tears, but from everything she’d never spoken aloud. I didn’t come for you, Lucien, she began. I came because of a promise, a phone call I couldn’t turn away from.
Lucien didn’t react, but his hands tightened slightly in his lap, as if even now it still hurt. Valeria continued, this time daring to meet his eyes, those eyes now filled with light, yet carrying something remarkably close to sadness. But I stayed not for the promise.