He knew.
If someone could have stood by her side at that moment, just as Shirley had back then, just as that little puppy had, perhaps her life afterward could have avoided that tragic ending.
But there was no one left.
Shirley and that little puppy had been the last glimmers of light in all her memories. From now on, from the moment she was locked inside this orphanage where daylight never reached until she fell into Hell, there would never again be anyone who could lead her out of the mire.
To live was to suffer.
The beautiful things she longed for had lasted only an afternoon, then ended abruptly on that bloodstained night. Or perhaps, from the moment she remembered those childhood experiences, she had already known that the last slender thread of hope she yearned for was gone.
This was her cruel fate.
Through the overlapping phantoms, Lynn slowly closed his eyes. She sat slumped before him with her head bowed. They faced each other, yet endless years lay between them.
And the greatest cruelty in the world.
Was being right in front of her, yet unable to become part of what she had lived through, unable to become someone within that picture.
You could not return to the past.
Nor could you change those facts already set in stone.
From that moment onward, the memories she had left in this subconscious began to lose their color. There was no more light. Every image gradually turned gray and white. Perhaps this was the last world she had seen, without a trace of life, without anything urging her to stay.
But the suffering continued.
For the next several years, her memories were confined to this damp, decaying orphanage.
Life there was like life in a concentration camp.
No