?Chapter 1018:


    One evening, Joelle returned on a rainy day. As she stepped out of the car, the driver quickly held an umbre over her. “Madam, please, don’t get wet. Mr. Miller will scold me again.”


    “I can get wet, but this violin can’t.”


    Joelle cradled a brand-new violin in her arms, careful to shield it from the rain. The wood wasn’t waterproof, so she pressed it close, rushing to take cover under the eaves.


    Once inside, she changed out of her soaked clothes and inspected the violin for damage. “Molly, could you bring me the strings I ordered from abroad?”


    The door creaked open, and Rnd stepped in, drenched from the rain. Joelle’s gaze met his, and her heart sank.


    She had poured more love and care into this boy than into her own flesh and blood, but it seemed the walls that had once been built with trust had crumbled beyond repair.


    Joelle could feel the distance between them now. “Rnd, is something wrong?”


    He stood before her, his wet hair clinging to his forehead, his eyes filled with an ocean of pain.


    “Save my mom.”


    He only said that.


    Joelle’s first instinct was to wrap him in warmth, so she reached for a nket, draping it around his shoulders.


    As she began to dry his hair, Rnd’s grip suddenly tightened around her wrist. His gaze locked onto hers, desperation flooding his features. “Will you save her?”


    Her voice softened, but there was a quiet strength in it. “Rnd, you know your mother’s condition. There’s nothing more that can be done. The treatment is futile now.”


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    “Are you just going to watch her die?”


    Joelle took a breath, steadying herself before she answered with patience. “Rnd, we’ve done everything we can.”


    Rnd fell silent for a moment, as if battling with himself to ept that another person was slipping away from his life.


    There was a time when he had loathed everyone—when he hated the world as a whole. But what he hated most was that no one would stay with him forever. They all left.


    “Aunt.” He lowered his head. “There’s something I need to ask you.”


    Rnd was far from ready to ept everything Katie had said. He wanted to uncover the truth on his own, to feel the pulse of reality with his own heart.


    When it came to the grudges Katie spoke of, he needed to hear Joelle’s side. “I’ve grown up. Stop treating me like a kid. If you want me to know right from wrong, then stop keeping things from me.”


    Hearing him say he was grown only reminded Joelle of how much he still had yet to understand. She dried his hair with a smile. “But in my eyes, you’ll always be my little one. And as for the past, it’s not your burden to carry. Your uncle and I have let it go. We’ve both lived through enough to know that harboring hatred only poisons you. Your uncle, once blinded by it, never truly knew happiness growing up.”


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