Originally Posted by
ubeliesel
Did he hate her, until the end? Or did he not care at all; that the news of her dying did not concern him at all?
As the man walked away, his figure became blurry, and Zhang Xiao realized that her eyeglasses had become foggy. Weakly she removed them, and the sight of him became nothing but a haze of colors, slowly disappearing. She saw him pause at the corner, but her vision didn’t allow her to see what went on in that face- was he bewildered? Unconcerned? But he continued on, and then it didn’t matter because he was gone.
Zhang Xiao felt as if all her energy had been sapped away, and her knees buckled. Her hand caught the edge of the glass display, steadying her, but her eyes caught something. The painting.
And very clearly she saw in her mind her own figure in that painting, the magnolia hairpin carefully tucked in her braid. In quick progression she remembered the second time he gave the pin to her, how he had gently put it in her hair, how his eyes, filled with love, admired her and told her she looked beautiful. And finally she understood that nobody but the two of them knew about that pin, how it had meant to both of them. And thus, no one could have commissioned this painting to be done exactly this way, but him!
He had never forgotten. He didn’t hate her. He had forgiven her!
As if woken from a trance, Zhang Xiao righted herself. Forgetting even to put on her glasses, she stumbled through the corridor, following the direction he took. She was panicking. What if he already left and she couldn’t catch him in time? What if she never finds him again? Zhang Xiao half-sobbed as she raced around the corner, hating herself for that moment’s indecision, wondering if this could possibly cause another lifetime of regrets.
But as she reached the other side, she crashed into another person going the same direction from which she came from. Strong arms steadied her, which she nearly threw aside, before seeing who they belonged to. Her spectacles fell from her useless hands, the sound of breaking glass echoing dully in that deserted hallway.
“Are you alright?”
He, Yinzhen, stared at her, his brows furrowed in concern. Zhang Xiao must’ve looked a fright, wild-eyed, with copious tears streaming down her cheeks, but she didn’t care. He came back. He didn’t go away! She lowered her head and clutched tightly at the hands that held her up, weeping silently. Of joy, of longing, of thankfulness. Never again, she swore. She decided that whatever happened in the future, these hands, she would never let them go.