Chapter 63 You're not, Irene!
His words made Irene snicker. "Oh, wait, don't tell me that you have too many of them and it would be hard to remember which one I'm talking about." She said, her eyes reddened with anger.
Irene didn't even know why she was so angry.
Maybe it was because she felt deceived, or maybe it was because... It was because Nelson had managed to show her a side of him she could have never imagined these past two weeks.
Maybe because it made her wish to fix the relationship he has with this Irene, and maybe something could happen between them when she returned... Irene didn't know.
All she knew was that... it hurt. Her chest hurt, it hurt so fucking much.
"Ah... Fuck." Victoria groaned again. Then she pointed at Irene before looking at Nelson. "I've said it before, she's gone crazy."
She had been saying it for a while now.
"She's calling Luna your mistress."
"Luna.. oh, that's her name," Irene repeated the name, allowing it to roll off her tongue. "It's pretty."
His words were sudden, something Irene wasn't expecting. She suddenly froze, her eyes widening in absolute shock. "What?"
She couldn't believe it.
Victoria walked towards them and crossed her hands again. "Why are you explaining what she already knows?" She asked confused at Nelson's explanation.
But Nelson ignored her and continued explaining. Irene stood still now, so he was able to hold her arms with his huge hands, forcing her to look at him. "She's my Aunt's daughter, my mum's older sister."
"I... I know what an aunt is." Irene subconsciously whispered.
His cousin?
She was his cousin?!
But in her universe...
Irene looked up to stare directly at Nelson's face, searching his blue eyes to see if there was any trace of deceit or mischievousness in them.
Maybe he was lying to get to calm down?
She saw none.
There wasn't any...
She shook her head, as tears suddenly began pouring out of her eyes. "What? Nelson this... She said..."
"I heard what she said, and why wouldn't she?" Victoria interrupted her before she could finish her question, although she didn't understand why Nelson suddenly explaining something Irene already knew calmed her... But she continued. "If it were your cousin who was going through what you put Nelson through, you would have said worse."
"But I..." Irene looked down, suddenly feeling a wave of embarrassment. Not just embarrassment, self-pity, and a few other emotions. "I thought... I thought that..." She cried, her voice breaking into a sob.
Fuck!
Irene cried inwardly.
She had forgotten the first thing, the first rule of being in an alternative universe... It was that, things were either a lot similar, or a lot different.
She should have asked before jumping to conclusions. She should have asked...
"How can you think that?" Victoria taunted. "How can you possibly..."
"Tori!" Nelson yelled suddenly. He turned to his side to look at her before speaking. "Can you give both of us some privacy?"
Privacy? Between the two of them? When Irene was still acting like a crazy person? No way.
"I'm not leaving you with her, I'm sorry but I'm not." She said, sounding adamant. "Yes, she's my friend... But heaven knows I don't trust her."
How could she after everything Irene had done over the course of two years?
Victoria had once been their biggest supporter, but after everything Irene had done... She didn't know who to support anymore, but it definitely wasn't her friend.
Until she got better or changed, Victoria chose to be on her opposing side. Helping everyone whom she had wronged, and there were quite a few.
Irene sniffled, bringing a finger to rub her nose before looking at Nelson, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. "She's your cousin?" She asked despite knowing the answer.
Nelson nodded. "Yes."
Irene's lips trembled.
God... She has been such an idiot..
"I'm sorry." She cried, and then shook her head. "I didn't know. I was just... In my universe, she was your girlfriend, and I just... I used that, I'm sorry."
Her universe?
"Luna has never been my girlfriend." Nelson tried to clear off.
But Irene didn't understand him; instead, she nodded, agreeing to his words, "Yeah, maybe not in this universe, but in mine..."
No...
He cleared his throat before speaking again. "Judging from my calculations, you've seen her only once right?" He asked, and Irene stopped crying, her focus fixed on him. "You were stopped by the idiot who had once blackmailed you during sophomore year, and Victoria came to save you."
That was... That was exactly what happened.
Irene looked up at him in surprise, her heart beating widely inside her chest.
Victoria... The most confused person among them, looked between her two friends, her brow wrinkled on her forehead. "Why are you speaking of something that happened, like what... Eight years ago." She could barely remember that, why was Nelson suddenly bringing it up?
And that was the first time Irene had seen Luna, she included, but it hadn't been the only time. They had seen that lady more than a dozen times after that.
"Y... Yes." Irene said, surprised that Nelson knew that. "How do you know that? That was the first and only time I've seen her." She confirmed, raising Victoria's suspicion level.
"I heard people calling her your... Nelson's girlfriend so I assumed she was... She was." She said the last bit to herself.
Because they were too close to be just friends.
But hold on a minute... Irene had missed the important part.
"Wait..." She brought her hands to her blurry eyes to clear the tears, "How do you know that? Did it happen in this universe too?"
"What's all this talk about this and that universe?" Victoria asked. First Irene said she was just eighteen, then she just kept mentioning universe bullshit... Victoria couldn't understand.
Irene turned to explain it to her. "That's because I'm from..."
"You're not." Nelson interrupted before Irene could finish her explanation.
But if his words did anything, it was to confuse both Victoria and Irene more.
"What are you saying?" Irene asked.
Maybe he didn't want Victoria to know?
No.
She had to know.
She tried to say
it again. "I'm from another..."
"You're not, Irene!" Nelson interrupted again, this time his voice firmer. "This is your life."