After an indeterminate time, the hospital room door finally opened. Wang Feng Yi, wearing a cold smile, walked out without glancing at her and disappeared at the end of the corridor.
She pushed the door and went in, approaching the bedside. Xia Xin Wei raised her trembling hand with effort, and she immediately reached out to hold it tightly. Tears suddenly burst forth. She knew she shouldn’t cry in front of her mother, but she couldn’t control herself. The long-suppressed emotions were on the verge of collapse. Why? Why was it always like this? She could never hold onto anything good. She could only watch her mother’s life slowly fading, watch the happiness in her hands disappear, and she was powerless. So, what could she possibly do in this world?
Xia Xin Wei’s lips moved without making a sound. Qian Zhi removed the oxygen mask from her face. Her breathing was shallow and chaotic, her lips pale and cracked, slightly trembling.
Her voice was weak and hoarse: “Qian Zhi… yes… yes…” Her voice gradually disappeared, her eyes slowly closing. A crystal-clear teardrop slid from the corner of her eye, falling on the snow-white pillow and then vanishing. The heart monitor beside her stopped beating at that moment, returning to a single straight line. All sound disappeared, and the world fell silent.
There was no loud wailing, everything was silent. She looked up at the long chimney emitting wisps of smoke, her heart seeming to have burned to ashes.
Life continued in this familiar city, with Qian Zhi starting her life alone again. She hadn’t told anyone about her mother’s death, not even Xing Tuo, who was in the United States for work. Every time he called, he would say, “Qian Zhi, when I return, we’ll get married.” And she would just smile silently. She often wandered the streets alone until nightfall, in the city streets suffused with twilight, where pedestrians and vehicles surged like tides, and the winter nights were bitingly cold.
That afternoon, she took half a day off to go to the hospital. For some time now, she had felt a subtle heaviness in her body, constantly plagued by dry heaving. The test results came back quickly: she was pregnant, already 11 weeks along.
Chapter 90: Brother’s Lover
Qian Zhi said, “I’ll go home and think about it.”
