Aftermath
"Are you a relative of Xu Weirong?" the policewoman asked, looking up.
"Yes," the girl, wearing a black baseball cap, replied softly.
"Sign here and on the line below." The policewoman pointed to the consent form with her finger, paused, and then said, "Make sure there are no problems before you sign."
The girl paused for a moment with the pen in her hand, then continued writing.
After signing her name, she tried to close the pen cap, but her hand was shaking.
The policewoman glanced at it: "It's fine, just leave it there."
The girl insisted on closing the pen cap, the brim of her hat obscuring her eyebrows and eyes, revealing only her tightly pursed lips.
After putting the pen back in its place, the girl picked up the consent form and handed it back to the policewoman with both hands: "Excuse me... is the body sent directly to the funeral home?"
The policewoman hummed in agreement, then, recalling the horrific scene in the video, couldn't help but add, "Don't you have any other relatives to help you with this?"
At this moment, the girl finally raised her chin slightly, and the policewoman saw a thin, pale face with red and swollen eyes.
The girl forced a smile: "It's just me."
The policewoman's gaze fell on the name she had just signed—"Tao Chu".
Does that mean the father is also gone, since the child doesn't take the mother's surname?
"Could I have that video that was played in the evidence room earlier?"
Seeing the girl looking at her with tears in her eyes, her despair mixed with hope, the policewoman's heart trembled.
She glanced around and saw that only her master was sitting in the corner, looking at his phone and drinking tea; everyone else had gone to have lunch.
She leaned forward and whispered, "According to regulations, I can't give it to you—the video was taken by the dashcam of the car behind."
After saying that, she raised her chin, pointed to the door, and said in a barely audible voice, "He's giving his testimony in room 407, it's almost over."
The girl immediately understood, bowed to her, and quickly ran towards 407.
The policewoman watched her retreating figure, dressed entirely in black, and sighed again.
"How many times have you sighed this morning?" The old policeman slammed his teacup down on the table.
The policewoman knew she had been overheard, so she turned to her boss and smiled, "That young girl came alone, she looks like a student, it's quite pitiful."
"You may be pitiful, but don't get yourself into trouble." The old policeman cleared his throat, picked up his teacup, and stood up.
The policewoman quickly took the water and, while pouring hot water, asked, "Master, I can tell something's not right, but surely it's not like I'd be implicated just because I said a few words?"
The old policeman took the teacup, which was about eight-tenths full, raised his eyelids, and asked, "What did you see?"
"She was so calm—except for when she saw the driver who caused the accident, she was very restrained. If she hadn't just looked up and revealed her swollen eyes from crying, one would have doubted that the mother and daughter had any feelings for each other at all."
"Hmph, those few cries when she saw the driver were all an act." The old policeman sneezed as his tea burned his lips, swallowed hard, and continued, "This girl is a scaredy-cat, she's on edge."
"You mean her mother's car accident..."
"You've seen the photos and videos from the scene. It seems like the driver was driving while fatigued?"
"The traffic police didn't say anything, and the forensic investigators didn't mention it either..."
The old policeman leaned back and shook his head at her.
The policewoman immediately realized—the fact that no one raised any objections meant there was something wrong behind it!
She didn't ask any more questions, sat back down at her workstation, and stared at the consent form on the table.
Tao Chu, she murmured the name silently, her brows furrowed.
Suddenly, she heard a girl's voice coming from the corridor—"Thank you, big brother."
The policewoman walked to the door and saw Tao Chu enter the bathroom around the corner, so she immediately followed him.
As soon as Tao Chu came out of the cubicle, she noticed the policewoman standing next to the sink. She instinctively turned around to look at the door handle signs of the adjacent cubicles—they were all green, and no one was there.
Tao Chu walked to the sink and turned the water on full blast, the water splashing through her hands.
"Sister, is there any other procedure?"
The policewoman could tell that she was indeed very wary, just as her master had said, so she leaned closer and asked, "Do you know Xiaoyaoda Logistics Company?"
Tao Chu in the mirror paused for a few seconds before answering, "Never heard of it."
The water continued to flow, and the policewoman remained silent.
Tao Chu turned her head slightly and said, "Thank you."
After turning off the tap, Tao Chu tore off a piece of paper to wipe the water droplets from her hands and left silently.
Before she stepped out of the Wanghu City Public Security Bureau, she saw a short, fat man making a phone call at the entrance, but his eyes were looking towards the gate. When he saw her, he turned away.
She quickened her pace, almost running, to get into the car, threw her bag onto the passenger seat, and drove off quickly.
She was only paying attention to whether any cars were following closely behind, but she didn't notice that a silver sedan had come out of the police station and overtaken her.
Upon arriving at the funeral home, Tao Chu saw two uniformed staff members standing at the front desk, with cameras at all four corners and transparent glass surrounding the area.
The sunlight streaming in made her feel a little safer.
Sitting in the empty hall, she waited for the body to be delivered before signing the confirmation.
While waiting, she kept her head down, staring at the video on her phone.
The time in the bottom right corner of the video is 8:43 AM on January 17th. Since it wasn't a holiday, there weren't many vehicles on the highway.
At the 12-second mark, the orange-yellow truck suddenly changed lanes to the left, and the vehicle filming the video slowed down slightly to let it pass.
Before the car had even straightened out, it continued to change lanes rapidly. The driver in the video muttered, "Damn, continuous lane changes!"
There was a white sedan driving in the far left lane. If the truck had slowed down in time, it would have just barely grazed the rear of the sedan before entering the lane.
Unexpectedly, the truck suddenly accelerated and rushed towards the white sedan.
In an instant, the car was slammed into the highway guardrail, overturned, and only a section of its white rear end was visible, the body of which was severely deformed.
The terrifying scene and the loud crash startled the driver of the car that was watching, causing him to brake suddenly. He was then rear-ended by the car behind him, amidst the sounds of sirens and angry shouts.
In the lower left corner of the image, thick smoke billows from the small section of the white car's rear end.
The video ends and repeats after 3 seconds.
Tao Chu stared at the video, her eyelids bulging painfully. The sweetness in her mouth faded, and she unwrapped a mint and popped it into her mouth.
Her mother, Xu Weirong, was sitting in the passenger seat of the white sedan, and the driver was her mother's old classmate and business partner, Zou Ming.
"Bang—" The truck in the video crashed and squeezed wildly once again, and Tao Chu raised his stiff fingers and withdrew tremblingly.
Eight years ago, my mother and Uncle Zou Ming were "driven out" of Jianglin City.
They were graduates of political and legal colleges in the capital in the late 1980s, and were undoubtedly the pride of the nation. After being introduced by Jianglin City, they began to make a name for themselves in the legal field.
Zou Ming entered the judicial department, while Xu Weirong worked in a law firm, but they were both equally righteous in their hatred of evil.
Xu Weirong insisted on representing the poorest people and handling the most difficult cases. With her outstanding professional skills and dashing appearance, she became the most trusted female lawyer in the hearts of the people of Jianglin City and made the headlines of newspapers several times.
But behind the glamour, there are countless open and hidden attacks.
Xu Weirong was threatened and beaten, but she never gave in.
Until one day, photos of her and Zou Ming seemingly kissing in a private setting were spread like wildfire through online articles, magazines, and tabloids.
The two-month investigation confirmed the rumors: Zou Ming was dismissed, Xu Weirong's lawyer's license was revoked for serious violations of professional ethics, and Tao Chu's father, Tao Guohua, also filed for divorce.
Only Tao Chu firmly believed in her mother, and Xu Weirong took her back to her hometown, Wanghu City, to live.
Soon after, Zou Ming also came to join Xu Weirong and they started a business together.
Later, Tao Chu was admitted to the School of Journalism at C University and studied abroad for three years until yesterday when she received the devastating news of her mother's death in a car accident. She flew back to handle the funeral arrangements.
With only a thin piece of the mint candy left in her mouth, Tao Chu slowly crushed it with her teeth, the tiny pieces of candy covering the tip of her tongue before she swallowed it in one gulp.
She glanced at the time on her phone, then got up to collect the ashes.
Tao Chu carried two urns containing ashes out of the funeral home and drove on an empty suburban road for quite some time before encountering a red light.
After braking, she looked at the blue sky and white clouds outside the windshield. The rare bright sunshine in winter made her feel warm and cozy. Suddenly, she thought to herself, "What a nice day!"
She was stunned for a moment. This involuntary thought felt like a punch to her face, hitting her nose and causing her excruciating pain.
Her eyelashes fluttered a few times, like a butterfly flapping its wings after a storm, and tears fell like rain.
What does it matter to her if the weather is nice?
In just one day and night, she visited the traffic police brigade, the public security bureau, the funeral home... Countless cold and broken scenes hammered at her heart.
She managed to handle everything with great effort, but now what should she do?
Confusion, anxiety, fear, and loneliness intertwined and assailed her. In this deserted place, she was finally able to truly let herself vent her emotions.
She only cried for twenty or thirty seconds. She figured the light would be green soon, so she wiped her tear-stained hands on her clothes.
The light turned green, and a silver sedan drove past her.
She sniffed and stepped on the gas, two barely concealed sobs escaping her throat.
The tears in her eyes lingered for a long time, but she didn't stop crying—after entering the city, there were many people and cars, and it was getting dark, so she drove with utmost concentration.
She only breathed a sigh of relief after carrying two boxes of ashes into her home.
As she looked at the closed door to her mother's room and then down at the urn in her arms, a wave of emotion welled up in her nose, forcing her to close her eyes tightly to ease the pain.
She carried the urn into her mother's room and gently placed it on the table.
The room was large, but besides the bed and wardrobe, there was only a height-adjustable desk and a drawer cabinet.
The table was neatly tidied; Xu Weirong has always been a clean person.
Tao Chu took out two sheets of paper and slowly wiped away the dust, his gaze wandering over the stacks of documents on the table.
The handwriting on the sticky notes, the annotations next to the reports, and the checkmarks on the calendar are all traces left by my mother.
Tao Chu thought she should sort out her mother's belongings, but the exhaustion of the past two days overwhelmed her, and she was so sleepy that she could barely keep her eyes open. She thought she should rest first before getting up to tidy up.
She planned to take a shower first, and after taking off her baseball cap, her short hair was revealed.
Wanghu City is much colder than C University; she hasn't taken off her hat since she rushed back.
She rubbed the red marks on her forehead from the brim of her hat while looking in the bathroom mirror.
She had taken off half of her clothes when she suddenly remembered her wounds. She turned her back to the mirror and glanced at the pinkish-white new flesh revealed after the scabs had fallen off her shoulders and back.
She bent her arms as she tried to pull off the hoodie, revealing clearly defined muscles in her shoulders and back.
Her ear got caught on her collar, and she hissed in pain, remembering the wound behind her ear.
She carefully pulled down her collar, finally stripping herself completely naked.
She looked at herself in the mirror with her short, cropped hair. Under the light, her short hair looked like a lawn that had been shaved in winter, completely exposed.
Last month, when she gritted her teeth and shaved off her paint-stained hair, she was worried that her mother would make fun of her by giving her a buzz cut when she went home for the Chinese New Year.
But now she's home, and her mother is gone.
Mom will never see her buzz cut again.
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