Chapter 127: Facing the Mirror
Being scolded by her is one thing, but the fact that she said it shows that her condition is indeed not good. Wang Lianhua shifted his head to make sure he could lie comfortably on her lap. In his mind, how could this not be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity? However, although he was in excruciating pain and sweating profusely, even if he wanted to speak, he first curled up his back.
Yes, no matter how bad her condition was, there was someone else crying out in the night wind.
But Wang Lianhua refused to acknowledge that pain represented something else. He shouldn't be pitiful or weak; these were things he should overcome. It was just a temporary sting, as were his cold hands and feet.
He gritted his teeth, half his gaze fixed on Xie Huailing's skirt, the other half on the drafty, dilapidated temple. In this moment, as murky as a quagmire, he desperately needed to say something, to pull him out, to prove that he was not one to be bound by suffering.
But the night only offered him Xie Huailing.
Tonight and now, there is only one Xie Huailing.
After she finished scolding him, she stopped talking and seemed to become a statue of Guanyin. He took a couple of breaths and called her name, "Xie Huailing."
"Not here."
Xie Huailing didn't really want to talk to him. Her mind was drowsy, half of it already suspended in mid-air. Although she was grateful to him for pulling her out of her sleep with a single word, she still didn't feel comfortable around him.
Wang Lianhua didn't care about all that; it suited his wishes anyway. His voice quickly rang out again. The volume was almost like a sleep-talking, but luckily he was on her lap, and the surroundings were quiet, so it could be heard clearly without any mistake: "I won't ask why, but why did you come to save me?"
Xie Huailing lowered her head, her face calm, and replied, "What do you want to hear?"
She felt his weight; in fact, she had already figured out roughly how much he weighed while changing clothes. The boy pressed down on her legs, against her lower abdomen, pushing him away only to have him lean back on his own. After a while, her hand landed on his head, running through his hair. Then she felt a warm spot, which traveled upwards from her fingertips. It seemed to be the last bit of warmth in the temple, but without her, he might have cooled down completely.
She said, "Listen to me, did your mother send me here? Don't even think about it. How old are you this year? Why do you insist on hearing me say such unpleasant things? You don't want to hear a story tonight, do you?"
"As for me picking you up, it's only because you're useful. You should be glad you're useful."
The boy seemed to be making some noise, but he couldn't do anything to her. On the other hand, although Xie Huailing was once again aloof, she didn't bother to look at him at all. She kept her eyes closed, and those subtle sensations came from her thighs and lower abdomen.
He leaned closer to her stomach, his hair brushing against her skin. He'd reached the point where he wanted to speak, and she stopped pushing him away. In a daze, amidst the shadows, she said, "You know you've been scolded so much. Nobody cares about you, nobody's annoyed with you, nobody bothers with you."
Wang Lianhua smiled.
A bright laugh, so real it was as if he had entered her arms, and he said, "How could that be? There are plenty of people in the world who hate me. At least you hate me terribly, don't you? Even if you hate me, you'll still be with me; we can't be separated."
Xie Huailing didn't argue with him. Instead, she thought of an old bronze mirror and said, "Do as you please. It's only natural for someone who had no friends as a child and could only talk to themselves in the mirror, and who hides the mirror when they grow up, to seek comfort in these things."
The person on his lap fell silent, likely because she had struck a nerve, causing him to feel a burning, agonizing pain. He might have hated her—hated how she knew, how she had the right to know. This hatred surpassed all his previous feelings; he hated that he would rather drag her down and suffer than inflict his own pain, that he should rather let himself rise and fall on her lap and against her abdomen than hurt himself. She, in turn, rose and fell against his chest: "...Interesting. How did you know?"
He said calmly, "You've come up with so much just because you left behind a mirror. It's because you empathize with me, isn't it? Aren't there just as many people who hate you as there are people who hate me?"
"Who wants to compare with you?" Xie Huailing didn't react. "Whether I hate it or not, I don't rely on these things to make a living, and I will never wait for them."
Wang Lianhua gripped her skirt tightly, so he buried himself deeper and deeper into her legs, and it became as if her soft flesh was embracing him. Even though it was not what he wanted, it brought a completely contradictory sense of separation, as if flesh and blood were being torn apart.
Xie Huailing's vision was blurry; she was still exhausted. But she had to pull herself together; she couldn't afford to fall asleep. "Instead of arguing so much, you should think about how you're going to explain things to your mother when you get back. I don't have much patience for you, and I won't be nice to you. You should know how annoying you are."
The view was obscured, with only a few glimmers of moonlight outlining a dilapidated shape. She glimpsed the remains of a Guanyin statue or some wooden Buddha, and with a final, painful shudder, these images melted away in her eyes. Wang Lianhua let out a low breath.
He knew, of course, that he disliked her even more than she did, but in the dim light of the crack, he desperately wanted to prove her wrong: "You talk a good game, but unfortunately, you're not exactly a likable person either. Of all the people I've ever met, you're the most annoying one."
"I'm really sorry, but I already have someone I hate the most."
Xie Huailing coldly replied, "Thank you for your dislike, but you're really not the one I dislike the most. I hope you meet someone even more disliked in the future."
Wang Lianhua, already in pain, was amused and wanted to say something more, but first gasped. He curled up even more, looking a few years younger, and suddenly moved on her legs, looking quite like a cat. Although he had called himself "sister," Xie Huailing didn't really know whether he was older or younger than her.
But upon closer reflection, he only seemed to be younger than her. She touched his head, and for no reason, thought of his appearance. She moved slightly, rubbing his face with her fingers, and then touched his face. Perhaps because she was really tired, she didn't even have the strength to argue with him anymore. She was calm and composed, and without opening her eyes, she wiped his face by touch.
She wiped away the dust that made him uncomfortable, and felt his trembling, which he was trying to suppress even when he was in extreme pain: "Be quiet."
She sighed again: "You're in so much pain, and you still have to argue with me. Even if you hate me, you don't need this one more thing, but you shouldn't deduct everything from me. Do you think that hating me means you won't hate the people you should hate?"
Xie Huailing touched his eyes, rubbed his eye sockets, and traced his face with a few fingers, gently tracing his stiffness with an unbelievable softness. She always had this ability to say the most hurtful things to him, but this also meant another possibility.
He discovered this possibility, and a sudden wave of nausea washed over him. The faint resemblance was nauseating enough, but why her again? Why could she see through him? This possibility shouldn't exist; he should only hate her… These words, combined, made him hate everything that night, wanting to vomit his insides, to let every drop of blood flow out like a river. He was already in the middle of that river, his blood the surging torrent.
But it was so empty, it should have been filled with something.
The moon finally appeared as she wiped his face clean. He saw the first ray of moonlight of the night, and everything that followed grew colder and colder. His hands and feet felt like stone, the silvery light melting around him. The only thing that hadn't made him feel as cold as a beam of moonlight was that she was holding him.
This was the source of all warmth, regardless of what he truly thought. Wang Lianhua suddenly felt weary, as if he had stumbled out of a storm.
He realized that no matter what, the person holding him shouldn't be Xie Huailing.
However, he was only given Xie Huailing.
This made him even more miserable.
And perhaps Xie Huailing understood his pain perfectly, like a child many years ago who once spoke to himself in a mirror.
The boy on her lap quieted down, and Xie Huailing touched his shoulder. A lingering soreness still radiated from his shoulder, as if he were riddled with wounds, as if it had always been this way. She didn't like being overwhelmed with emotions, but tonight, a bridge had been drawn, and to shake off sleepiness, she needed to think about something.
What was Wang Yunmeng thinking when she gave birth to the man in her arms? At that time, she was deeply in love with Chai Yuguan, their love seemingly boundless. However, her inherent coldness, even in its deepest years, affected him, and when Chai Yuguan betrayed her, it became uncontrollable. So what about him? How much did he love her? Did he truly feel no hatred at all? Or did he simply want to stop hating and instead choose to love?
She thought for a moment, then quickly gave up. The cicadas outside had stopped chirping sometime ago, and she wondered what had happened.
Suddenly, the boy nuzzled against her, but then she realized he wasn't nuzzling; he was trying to turn over but couldn't. Xie Huailing wanted to stop him from moving, so she pressed down on his back, patted him, and then gently stroked him back down.
Then he spoke, and I don't know what he was thinking: "So, have you ever had a mirror?"
"That's not important." She understood what he actually wanted to ask. Whether it was true or not, it was just a mirror now.
"Now that it's over, the past is the past," she said softly. "Don't dwell on what's gone."
The so-called regrets, the so-called past concerns... are all things that should not be cared about now that they are in the past. Even if you want to forget everything from the past, it will come back to you in the dead of night.
Wang Lianhua pressed on, "You make it sound so easy. Can you really not care? Don't you have any regrets or sleepless nights?"
She didn't answer, and he guessed it, saying to her, "This is my last question."
Then his hand rested on her leg, as if he were lying there. Xie Huailing finally opened her eyes. The emptiness opened, all was silent. She drifted in some unknown direction, only to suddenly return to her body. That moment felt like ten thousand years, yet it was just a moment. After that moment, she exhaled, and slowly her voice returned. She first complained, "So annoying."
Then she said, "That doesn't matter."
The heavens and earth were like a ribbon, startlingly white, with only the two of them remaining. Guanyin's shadow fell again, and he stared motionlessly. Xie Huailing lowered his eyes at that moment, his tone merely coaxing him:
"None of it matters—I don't regret anything I've lost, nor anything I've never had, nor any of the decisions I've made."
After that, neither of them spoke again, and neither of them could afford to be more calm and peaceful.
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