Jiang Tingzhou paused for a moment, then said, "Then you don't need to leave. I will be leaving Beicheng soon. You can come back, or you can never come back."
Never coming back...
Just hearing those words felt like a needle soaked in salt water pierced Xu Wan's heart. It seemed insignificant, but only she knew how much it hurt.
Xu Wan smiled and said, "Why are you telling me this? As far as the two of us are concerned, we have no relationship anymore. Whether you come back or not, I don't care. I just hope that you will stop being presumptuous and doing unnecessary things, thinking that you are doing it for my own good, but I don't need it at all."
"I see."
The man's answer was simple.
Xu Wan seemed uneasy and asked again, "So, this means we've reached an agreement. You won't interfere in my affairs anymore, right? You won't meddle in anything I do anymore, right?"
"..."
"No matter where I work, who I associate with, or who I marry or have children with in the future, you won't care, right?"
"..."
"Speak up, or I won't feel at ease."
Xu Wan rested her hands on the table, her gaze quietly fixed on the man opposite her.
Waiting for his reply.
She could see that the man's fingers, which had been casually resting on the armrest of the wheelchair, tightened slightly, his veins bulging and his knuckles turning white.
Xu Wan pressed on, tapping the table. "Mr. Ryan, President Jiang, Jiang Tingzhou, speak to me. I need a guarantee, a guarantee that you will no longer disturb my life. I don't want all my plans to be suddenly disrupted by a stranger like this time."
The office was unusually quiet.
So much so that the sound of the spring breeze blowing through the flowering trees outside the window is hard to ignore.
After an unknown amount of time, the man finally spoke weakly, "Wanwan, that law firm really isn't right for you, otherwise I..."
“Mr. Jiang, if you care so much about a stranger’s affairs, why not care about the children in the mountains who can’t afford to go to school, or those poor girls who can’t afford sanitary napkins, or even if there are any stray cats outside the compound that haven’t been spayed or neutered? They all desperately need care from others, while I… don’t need it.”
Xu Wan recounted the story earnestly.
She had never been so tense with a man before.
“I can care about them,” the man said. “I just…”
"Jiang Tingzhou, what exactly do you want? You're dead, what right do you have to interfere in my life?!"
Xu Wan interrupted the man.
She circled halfway around and stood in front of the man, her calves touching the tips of his shoes. With her eyes slightly lowered, she said earnestly, "Mr. Jiang, you're not telling me your identity because you want to be a dead person in my life, aren't you? A dead person can't boss around the living. All they can do is stay obediently in memories, remain the same as before, and then... be let go by the living and eventually be forgotten."
The man was wearing a shirt with the French cuffs slightly loose.
Xu Wan bent down, took the loose rubber band off the man's wrist, and casually made a gesture as if she was throwing something out the window!
"Don't!"
Jiang Tingzhou thought the woman had thrown away the rubber band and almost uncontrollably tried to stand up from his wheelchair.
He made a pushing motion, his body instinctively leaning forward, and he looked like he was about to fall over.
Xu Wan grabbed the man's shoulder with one hand and pressed down on the armrest of the wheelchair with the other.
The two were brought very close. Xu Wan looked down at the man and said, "President Jiang, you're living in the past too, aren't you? Even though I'm standing right in front of you, you're still clinging to an old hair tie. So what you want isn't the me you have now, is it? What you miss is just the past, isn't it?"
Whether intentionally or unintentionally, the man's fingers pressed against the woman's fingers on the armrest of her wheelchair, without shifting them even slightly.
Xu Wan withdrew her hand.
She looked at the man so close to her and said, "Jiang Tingzhou, I'm asking you one last time about our relationship. If what you want isn't the past, but the present and the future, then tell me now. If you've already let go of everything and only want to be strangers with me, then please tell me too, and I promise I'll avoid you from now on."
Xu Wan stuffed the rubber band she had just taken into the man's hand. Just as she was about to get up, the man's hand grabbed the back of her neck first.
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