I thought the most painful moment was hearing him say at the airport: I love you… Give me three more minutes. I didn’t look back.
When he told me his marriage was fake and the missed opportunities were due to his heavy responsibilities, I thought: This must be the limit; nothing could be more tragic than this. But I underestimated him again. A man loves you to this extent, yet he isn’t even your fiancé!
“Darling,” Ye Zhengchen said: “Give me a month. If you still choose Yin Zhongtian after a month, I won’t appear again.” He overestimated me; I didn’t even have the confidence to get through tonight!
Before I could respond, he patted my shoulder. “It’s late, go to sleep. You have to pick up your fiancé early tomorrow.” “Go to sleep” from Ye Zhengchen definitely didn’t just mean a static action. Although I was mentally prepared, when he unabashedly made this request, I felt oxygen-deprived, and my legs went numb.
Leaning against the windowsill, my voice was so small I could barely hear myself. “Okay, I’ll go take a shower first.” His hand on my shoulder tightened, and he repeated one word in a low voice: “First…” First… meant there would be a then.
Without daring to pause, I ran into the bathroom, letting the rushing water wash away the trembling in my body.
I applied shower gel countless times, washed countless times, almost until dawn. Standing in front of the mirror covered in water vapor, I brushed the wet hair from my forehead. The blurry silhouette reflected in the mirror, beneath the black hair, showed every inch of reddened skin trembling in the mist. Once, I had hated him deeply, believing that giving my body wouldn’t mean giving my heart. This time, the hate faded, and I lost confidence in myself.
I lowered my head, cupped cold water from the faucet, and splashed it on my face. The intense stimulation calmed me. What must be faced will always be faced; there’s no escaping it.
I pulled off the ring from my hand, placed it on the glass table, and said to my reflection: “One last time. Bao Bing, you can do this.”
I dried my hair, wrapped myself in a towel, took a deep breath, and walked out of the bathroom.
