Chapter 1
NovelPotato ·
Chapter 1
The day I received my divorce certificate, the first thing I did was remove Gu Huai as my emergency contact.
He hadn't come to the Civil Affairs Bureau. His assistant came instead, carrying a bouquet of white roses. The card had just one sentence: “Stop sulking. Come home for dinner tonight.”
I stood by the entrance, looking at the flowers for a long time.
Three years earlier, when I'd miscarried, he'd sent his assistant then, too.
White roses again.
The card said, “Get some rest.”
Two years earlier, on my birthday, he had been at the opening of Shen Qinghe's art exhibition. His assistant had brought me a birthday cake and a bouquet of white roses.
“Happy birthday.”
A year earlier, I'd had a gastric hemorrhage. He'd said Shen Qinghe had only just returned to the country and wasn't familiar with the hospitals here. He had to stay with her.
His assistant brought me a bowl of rice porridge.
And white roses.
“Try to eat a little more.”
White roses. More white roses. Always white roses.
Every moment when he should have been there himself had become another bouquet delivered by his assistant.
I left the flowers behind. I took a photo of the divorce certificate and sent it to him.
Half an hour later, he replied.
“Su Wen, do you really have to go this far to force my hand?”
Looking at the screen, I suddenly felt a weight lift. Not explaining myself was so much easier than explaining.
I switched off my phone and went into the hospital. My final operation was scheduled for three that afternoon.
The nurse handed me the consent form.
“Is anyone from your family here to sign?”
“I just got divorced.”
She looked up at me, asked nothing more, and slid a pen across. I signed in the space marked “Patient's own signature.”
Su Wen.
I'd written that name on guarantees for Gu Huai's company, on the mortgage application for our marital home, on the early branding proposals I'd drawn up when he started his business, and on one hospital bill after another.
This time, I was signing for myself.
The nurse came over to confirm my details.
“Su Wen, twenty-eight?”
“Yes.”
“Hysteroscopic surgery. You'll need follow-up appointments afterward. Avoid overexertion during your recovery.”
“Yes.”
“Is Mr. Gu Huai still your emergency contact?”
I paused, then shook my head.
“Remove him.”
She looked momentarily surprised.
“He doesn't need to be notified about me anymore,” I said.
She lowered her head and updated the records.
My phone lit up again. A message from Gu Huai.
“Seven o'clock. Come home. Mom's here too.”
I stared at “Mom's here too” for a few seconds.
He always did this. He never said he wanted to see me. Only that the family was waiting, that an elder was waiting, that a whole table of guests was waiting. As though invoking someone else meant I had to be reasonable.
Before the anesthetic, I heard the girl in the next bed call her boyfriend.
“I'm a little scared. Come quickly.”
I couldn't hear his answer. She gave a quiet laugh.
“All right. I'll wait for you.”
I closed my eyes.
I had waited like that once. For Gu Huai to come to the hospital. For him to remember my birthday. For him to say even one word when his mother insulted me. For him to choose me over Shen Qinghe, just once.
Only later did I understand. When someone never came, distance wasn't the reason.
They simply didn't want to.
When Gu Huai received the photo, he was at Shen Qinghe's gallery.
Her new exhibition was about to open. One of the lights was tilted a few degrees off. She stood in the middle of the room, her eyes red.
“Huai, am I really that useless? I can't even get something this small right.”
He spent half an hour adjusting it for her. He'd never liked dealing with such trivial things.
But Shen Qinghe was different.
Whenever she lowered her head, he remembered the girl who had emailed him from abroad years earlier, saying she couldn't keep going on her own.
His phone vibrated as he watched the light fall across a painting. He looked down at the photo I'd sent.
Two divorce-certificate booklets. A glaring red.
He frowned slightly. Shen Qinghe leaned closer, glanced at the screen, and her expression changed.
“Is it because of me... Is your wife angry again?” Her voice was quiet. “Perhaps I should explain to her. I really don't want to come between you two.”
He laid his phone facedown.
“No need.”
She pressed her lips together. “But she's even sent you the divorce certificates.”
He gave a cold laugh.
“She's always like this. Once she's made enough of a fuss, she'll come back.”
He sounded so sure that, as Shen Qinghe lowered her eyes, she could barely hide the smile at the corner of her mouth.
He didn't see it.
He called me. Once. No answer.
Twice. No answer.