Chapter 46

This was a calamity I had created with my own hands. I could clearly hear something collapsing.

The bottle shards flew out in all directions, along with the wine. Red wine splattered onto the walls and ran down like blood.

I fell and sat on the floor, completely unable to think. My head was filled with Yan Yang's words. He said he didn't believe it anymore.

He didn't believe it anymore.

When his father came out of the kitchen with a knife raised in his hand, I was like a spectator watching him furiously stride towards me. As his knife struck out, I didn't dodge either. I just stared straight at him.

It seemed like I didn't know who he was anymore, and I was no longer myself either.

But his knife didn't touch my body. He was pushed away by Yan Yang's mum as she screamed.

The knife fell out of his hand and landed on the sofa. He pushed her aside and went to pick it up again.

I stayed there motionless, simply watching. I suddenly felt like all of the struggle had been meaningless.

It was like we were playing a pitiable farce. I didn't even know whether this should be labelled a comedy or a tragedy.

I heard him roar, “Why didn't you die along with your mother?”

Yes, why hadn't I died along with my mother?

His words awakened me. I finally returned to my senses and understood something.

I should have died long ago. The three of them were the ones that made up a family.

I stood up and straightened out my clothes. I said to him, “As long as you're not dead, I won't be dead either.”

I shifted my gaze to Yan Yang's mother. She was crying very pitifully; such a beautiful and gentle woman was now sitting with her hair in a mess and tears streaked all over her face. I felt very apologetic towards her.

I bowed to her, “I'm sorry.”

Then I looked back at the man she was desperately pulling back and said, “I hope you die too.”

As I walked past them, about to leave, I looked back at the tightly closed door of the bedroom. That room was now a crystal coffin to me. The person I loved was lying inside, his heart dead. He was dead not because of anything else, but because he refused to face me.

Because of me, a laughable family ethics drama had played out in this family on the night of Chinese New Year’s Eve.

The saying goes, ‘the family is ruined and the people are dead’. Now that the family had been ruined, there ought to be people dead as well.

I walked leisurely to the main door, but I couldn't concentrate at all. My eyes couldn't focus on anything. Ninety percent of my soul had already left my body, and the remaining wisp was also barely holding on.

I wanted to appear calm and unaffected, but I was still defeated in the end.

When I was about to turn the doorknob and leave, I heard him agonisingly spit out, “Your mother wanted me to die more than anything, and you also want nothing more than for me to die. I should have just let her kill me back then!”

I froze there, suddenly unable to understand his words.

What did he mean by ‘I should have just let her kill me back then’?

I turned back to look at him. He went to search for the knife again while Yan Yang’s mother screamed and cried for Yan Yang to come out.

When Yan Yang heard the noise and came out, his dad had already pushed his mum away and was walking towards me with the knife in his hand. My eyes could only see Yan Yang; I pinned my gaze on him alone. To me, that knife was irrelevant.

It was really complete chaos. Everyone had already broken down. Yan Yang was scared out of his wits, rushing over to stop his father. Him and his mother pinned his father down together and turned to me to tell me to quickly leave.

I said, “Yan Yang, will you go with me?”

He looked at me in disbelief. He didn’t reply and instead turned to hug his father.

This family hugged each other as they cried. I remained the repulsive outsider.

That day, when I left, I was also in a terrible shape. It was so bad that I had to recover by the roadside for a long while before I could even remember what my name was.

My phone was missing. I had probably lost it in Yan Yang’s house.

But I still had my cigarettes. Inside the pack, there was still one last cigarette.

I smoked that cigarette as I walked ahead on the road.

It was the night of Chinese New Year’s Eve; there was basically no one on the roads, and very few cars too. No amount of red lanterns or New Year couplets written to the brim with hopeful wishes could cover up the loneliness of this city at this moment. It couldn’t be livened up anymore.

I kept walking, with no destination in mind, but in the end I still arrived at the place I should be.

Where one comes from, is where one must return to.

I had come from the mud, so I was destined to return to the mud.

I stood in front of the old apartment. It took a long time for me to fish out my keys. When I opened the door, I realised the door lock had actually spoilt, but when I entered, I saw not much had changed in the house.

This was a place that even thieves wouldn’t patronise.

I walked in. The place was covered in dust, and it was so cold it felt like a freezer.

I walked to the bedroom, then opened the closet door and sat inside.

All 1.8 metres of me curled up inside the closet, just like how I had as a child.

I hugged my knees to my chest, closed my eyes, and groggily fell asleep.