(55) True Suchness

  I've never told him I love him before, and the first time I use this word is in a situation like this.

  I did all of this from start to finish without shedding a tear, although I was crying in my heart, but I felt relieved.

  Yang Yu sat up from the adjacent seat, slightly tidying her hair with a hint of coquetry, then walked over to me and flashed her phone at Du Hui: "Miss Du, be careful when lying, I can take sneaky photos too."

  Even I was surprised, completely unaware of when she secretly recorded it.

  I poked her: "Turn around and send a copy to Lawyer Su too, let him take a look at my ugly face."

  Yang Yu pulled me out, rolling her eyes in disdain: "You should be single, first letting someone steal your boyfriend and now someone stealing your fiancé, only you would fall for this trick, stupid to the core..."

  "It doesn't matter," Jiang Hui said, "'If it's not meant to be, then let's just switch and come again.'"

  "Figured it out?"

  "I suppose so!"

  The bell above the café door rang out cheerfully as I emerged from Su Hao and Du Hui's past, feeling carefree.

  Yang Yu turned back and looked at the two people left alone in the coffee shop, and asked me with some concern: "Are we just leaving like this? Is it really okay?"

  "Ah, probably okay."

  From now on, hold a trusting heart and follow nature.

  ————————

  I sang with Yang Yu for four hours, singing until my throat was hoarse and couldn't find the pitch, before driving back home.

  I walked along the small road and turned back to 187, Mr. Su's black Renault was parked opposite the door. I thought he had come to my house again, but found him standing in front of me at some point.

  "You've been drinking."

  "Yes, you've started smoking."

  "Yeah, I quit for a long time."

  It means I just started smoking recently.

  I have never seen him smoke before.

  Two sentences without nutrition, standing silently for a minute, I and he spoke at the same time, and simultaneously stopped.

  This melodramatic plot is just like a romance novel.

  We both became characters in the play.

  I remained silent and waited for him to speak first.

  "What did you mean by what you said today?"

  "Which one?"

  "Erase the past..."

  I suddenly realized and responded with a sound: "It's the literal meaning, our past was too beautiful, making our present unbearable... In those years we were apart, we all changed, when we meet again, except for the past, we are just two people who know each other..."

  "How can it be 'just acquaintance'?" He grasped my two arms, and although his tone was suppressed very well, I still heard a few imperceptible urgencies and fluster.

  Some guilt, but don't know where to start.

  "Su Hao, we are no longer the us of the past... those years when we were apart, missing each other's growth, we have changed long ago, don't you know?" I finally couldn't hold back, and shed tears of sorrow.

  His lips opened and closed, his eyelids trembled: "Are you taking revenge on me? Did I wrong you? Did I bully you, right?"

  No...

  I am because...

  Found out that the Su Hao I loved had disappeared...

  Because I couldn't find him...

  I wanted to deny it, but I couldn't speak through tears.

  No one can understand this feeling of mine.

  One day, you discover that the person you love, apart from their gentle appearance, is completely different from the one you had etched in your heart...

  It's as if you only knew his shell...

  The person you know is not the same as the one others know...

  That feeling...

  After all... I still can't accept that he used to belong to someone else, belonged to others before, right?

  I cried in his arms for a long time and felt that I couldn't go on like this, so I asked: "If... those photos were really taken by someone I found, what would you do?"

  "Shall we not make such an assumption?"

  "Can't you accept it? Then let's change the subject, if I were with another man..."

  "No, this assumption won't work either..."

  I forced a smile, but didn't even have the energy to maintain a facade.

  "Look, you can't even accept the assumption..."

  How can I bear it again...

  He held me in his arms, tighter and tighter, his chin rubbing against my head, trying to comfort me completely.

  I let him hold me unilaterally, without any response.

  "That photo thing... I'm sorry, Du Hui... I've also made it clear to her." After a long silence, his voice was hoarse and suppressed as he spoke up "I didn't plan on having another woman besides you, she was an accident, a Chinese woman who was sold to **course... whether it was because of drunken sex or being drugged, it's an established fact that I won't deny... I only had that one time with her, just once..."

  His voice began to tremble, paused, and his arms tightened around me.

  Irregular gasps echoed beside my ear, with an uneasy voice becoming muffled "Just once... are you going to deny me..."

  How can it be... just once?

  Can you believe what this man is saying?

  He said so, I can only believe it?

  Can't you just ask Du Hui one more time, in three or four years of being together, you two have only been to bed once?

  This is such an absurd thing, just thinking about it makes me speechless.

  Should I believe him?

  Was I already shaken when this question was asked?

  "Is surname Ai Ke..."

  He interrupted and answered hastily before I could finish asking.

  "Does your school have this kind of course?" Forgive me for being ignorant, I had no idea such a thing existed, and I'm shocked. Has it become that open abroad?

  "He shook his head: 'It's a private club.'"

  I was speechless at once.

  Should you say Du Hui is unlucky or should you say she's lucky? In the countless ups and downs of the adult industry, she easily sold herself to a private club. What? Do foreigners have a preference for Eastern beauties?

  I highly doubt it.

  He also knew I didn't believe it.

  "Hold me tight, don't let go... with a pitiful and fearful tone I've never heard before: 'Don't do this... deny me, okay? Our past... I couldn't erase it, it's etched deep into my veins, sixteen years, Fu Yingxue... sixteen years, how can you make me forget? Do you want... me to die?'"

  The tremble in his voice pierced through and strongly struck my heart, causing infinite resonance.

  Just like the years he left me, every time I wanted to forget him, I could only be forced to remember more clearly. Because from childhood to adulthood, he has been omnipresent in my life, silently transforming himself into the main line of my growth. If you want to forget, you have to cut out the past decade or so, what's left of me?

  I won't wipe it away either.

  But what he said that day really became a thorn in my heart.

  Compared to the simple and innocent self of childhood, I have indeed learned many "evil ways" and also have a sharp tongue that can't be stopped.

  Time is passing by, and the era is getting closer to darkness, who can guarantee that one's life will be pure and noble?

  Even the lotus flower cannot guarantee its own genes, who dares to claim themselves 'emerging from the mud without being stained'?

  I'm actually afraid that the self I've loved for so many years will be surpassed by him, and my greatest emotional rival is not someone else, but myself.

  Early spring nights are cool.

  The two of us sat silently in the car.

  He leaned back in his chair with his eyes closed, while I turned my head and gazed out of the window.

  I really don't know what to say.

  But he didn't let me go back either.

  I'm worried too.

  I was worried sick, rubbed my face and forced myself to regain some strength. I asked him: "When you smashed the photo in front of me that day, what were you thinking?"

  Breathing almost imperceptibly paused for a moment, then resumed its regular rhythm.

  I guess he might be unwilling to answer, or fell asleep when his voice came through.

  "I've been furious all along, thinking that as long as you admit it, I'll strip you naked and beat you up..."

  "Aren't you feeling guilty at all?"

  "There is, but more anger and self-blame." He raised his hand, with the back of it against his forehead, his eyelashes twitching, his Adam's apple bobbing. In the end, he let out a sigh: "Before I went abroad, on the day I sent you home, Uncle Fu asked me what I really wanted to do... You were still so young, and one misstep could have ruined everything... I promised Uncle Fu that I wouldn't spoil you too much. At the time, thinking about that day made me angry, afraid that my indulgence would lead you astray... I was very scared..."

  "Your reaction afterwards completely threw me off. You looked into my eyes... and all I saw was disappointment, finality... you even returned the ring to me... I didn't chase after you, did I?"

  "When you asked me, your eyes were full of disgust, I was stunned at that moment, and my rationality and ability to act were gone..." He said more and more self-deprecatingly, and couldn't help but laugh "If I could cry, I would probably really cry."

  "Am I that important to you?"

  "Yes." He grasped my hand and placed it on the position of his heart, closing his eyes to say: "You've lived here for seventeen years, coexisting with it, besides you, there's never been anyone else..."

  "You're always so good with words."

  "It's because you never believe me." He smiled wryly: "Being profound and introverted may be intimidating to others, but with you, it would only bring me endless trouble."

  "You think I don't understand human relationships?"

  "The most genuine side is forever reserved for the one you love."

  “……”xh118