heartless - adachi yuto

ten

Like the night before, Nao found herself back in front of Lord Yuto's bedroom door. She had worked diligently today, cooking and cleaning. Then, she covered Kin's job in the garden so she could be with Wooseok for an hour. (Nao felt it was the least she could do for being nosy and watching them the night before).

"Lord Yuto?" Nao knocked twice before opening the door, finding Lord Yuto already sitting there on his bed, patiently waiting for her.

"You are late," he mumbled.

"I did not want the cream to be scorching hot when I applied it, so I made sure it had time to cool down," Nao apologized, the large bowl of cream in her hands.

The cream was a light-green color, and smelled like melon. It was sticky and thick, Nao's mother saying that the thicker the cream, the bigger affects it would have on the wounds.

Nao placed the large bowl onto the table in the middle of the room, looking at Lord Yuto with her hands in front of her robe.

"Would you like me to start applying now?" Nao asked.

Lord Yuto nodded.

Nao turned away from him and grabbed a handful of cream in her hand. When she turned around, she saw Lord Yuto undoing the buttons on his large robe.

"What are you doing?" Nao asked, her eyes wide. She was never told that Lord Yuto would be stripping for her.

"Did you think the scars stopped at my neck?" Lord Yuto answered, an annoyed look on his face.

He undid all the buttons and the string on his robe before removing the heavy fabric from his body. Nao gasped at all the scars that littered his body, from his wrists to his chest to his shoulders and back. Lord Yuto was also a skinny but slightly muscular man. Seeing him like this was a reminder to her that Lord Yuto was merely a year older than she was.

"Why are they all new?" Nao asked, "Are they self-inflicted?"

"You ask too many questions." Lord Yuto groaned, as he wrapped his robe around his lower body. "Why don't you just start applying the cream?"

Nao wanted to curse him but simply bit her tongue. She did not want to dig herself a hole and make Lord Yuto angry. So, she walked up to him and rubbed both her palms into the cream before applying it to his chest.

"Ah!" Lord Yuto gasped at burning sensation that spread across his skin. He never imagined that the pain would feel be so intense. His eyes squeezed shut as Nao continued to rub the cream across his chest.

"It will burn for thirty minutes at most," Nao informed him, "but it will have a cooling sensation afterwards."

Nao applied the cream to his neck, Lord Yuto turning away involuntarily from Nao's hands. He growled, his chest heaving from his deep breaths.

"Are you applying it slowly just to see me in pain?" Lord Yuto asked, looking into Nao's eyes.

"I have to be deliberate and apply it everywhere," Nao answered.

Nao sighed, knowing the pain that Lord Yuto felt was excruciating. However, she knew that the cooling sensation would help him sleep, and the smell as well would soothe him.

Nao moved onto his back, scooping another handful of the cream. She smeared the cream down Lord Yuto's back in a fast motion, and he yelled, reaching around and grabbing her hand. Nao looked at his face and could see the beads of sweat forming on his forehead, and the tears that threatened to fall from his eyes.

"If I knew you were going to put me in pain, I would not have let you do this!" Lord Yuto screamed into her face, "I would rather have these ugly scars than undergo this pain."

Nao did not tremble. She looked at Lord Yuto with a straight face, before using the back of her hand and wiping the tear that managed to fall from his eye. "I am sorry you are in so much pain, please do not cry, Lord Yuto. I promise I will not do this again after tonight."

Lord Yuto's eye widened when her finger brushed his face. He wanted to yell again, but he could bring himself to for some strange reason. It was as if something overcame him and grabbed him by his throat. This was an indescribable feeling that he had never felt before, and he did not know how to react to it.

"I have covered everywhere aside from your eye," Nao said softly, "do you want me to skip it? It will not hurt as much as the other parts of your body, I promise, Lord Yuto."

Lord Yuto already decided that he wanted the cream on the skin where his eye was. It itched and burned and gave him a headache. He wanted the pain to leave, and if the cream was the best way, he would do it.

"I told you I wanted the cream everywhere I had scars," Lord Yuto answered, "did I not?"

Nao nodded, standing in front of him again. She had heard rumors from the other maids about what was underneath his eye patch, and she truly was not ready to see what laid underneath. Some said that the skin had been infected and foamed this disgusting puss, while other woman said there was a gaping hole that his skin could not close.

"Are you ready?" Nao asked, more to herself than to Lord Yuto.

"Stop pestering me," Lord Yuto responded.

Nao, with some cream on her right hand, gently lifted the eye patch up with her left hand. Her eyes were half-closed, scared of what she would see.

There was no gaping hole, and there was no disgusting foam. There was a large scar that crossed from the top corner of Lord Yuto's nose to just next to his ear. The "hole" in Lord Yuto's face was just his damaged eyelids. Lord Yuto's eye was not as sickening as Nao thought it would be.

Nao gently pressed the last bit of cream onto Lord Yuto's eye scar, gently rubbing it in. Lord Yuto did not scream this time, but only cringed, his eye shut tight. The pain was present, but it was not as terrible as the pain that covered the rest of his body.

"Lord Yuto?" Nao called, her voice barely above a whisper.

"You talk too much to be a maid, you annoy me," Lord Yuto groaned, "what do you want?"

"Even though you have these large scars across your body, and you do not have your eye," Nao said, "I want you to know that there are women in the nation who think you are handsome, Lord Yuto. A lot of pe-"

"Get out of my bedroom," Lord Yuto said, glaring at Nao. Nao backed away immediately, turning to pick up the bowl.

"I-I am sorry, I was only trying t-"

"Get out!" Lord Yuto yelled, and Nao could feel the tears in her eyes form when she could hear the anger in his voice. She was simply trying to make him feel better, and she had angered him.

I keep making stupid mistakes, Nao thought to herself, as she ran out of the bedroom, the door shutting behind her.

Lord Yuto stood from the bed, putting the eye patch back in place, before pulling his robes back onto his body.

"Damnit! " Lord Yuto cursed to himself, the blush in his cheeks still present.