37. From now on, I'll feel much lighter.
As soon as he finished speaking, Chu Chiyi's mind suddenly jolted uncontrollably.
Has the sword that had hung over his head for ten years finally fallen?
But he wasn't unprepared.
In fact, he was preparing and rehearsing every single day of those ten years.
But since we've rehearsed countless times and prepared so well, why does my heart still clench and a wave of emotion surge uncontrollably at this moment?
Is it because some things are useless even if you prepare for them?
Yes, he only just realized it himself. Even after tens of thousands of daily early warning drills, the feeling of being pierced through the heart and bleeding on the spot when the real attack comes is something that cannot be practiced in advance.
He has only himself to blame; he realized this too late.
He swallowed hard, desperately suppressing something surging within him that was almost beyond his control in front of Mu Jia. At the same time, he tasted the strong metallic taste of blood in his mouth.
His last shred of reason suddenly asked him, rather inopportunely, "Why now?"
According to her prediction, shouldn't it be at least after he confesses his feelings to her?
But why now of all times? Just a second before he finally decided to confess his feelings to her.
The next second, he heard himself ask, "Why?"
After Mu Jia finished speaking, she let out a long sigh of relief.
She lowered her head.
Then came silence. A silence that was clearly too long…
But she didn't look up; she just stared at her own shadow on the ground, which was sometimes long and sometimes short.
I don't know how much time passed before I heard him ask, "Why?"
She finally looked up, but was caught off guard by the reddened corners of his eyes, and was shocked for a moment.
After looking at it for a few seconds, she gently shook her head and began to seriously consider his question.
Why?
Did the sudden discovery of Yuan Mei's illness give her many new insights into life? Did reminiscing about the past make her understand many things more clearly? Because of life, work, family... she has already exhausted herself on too many things, so she can't afford to exhaust herself on anything else?
But is it meaningful to tell him these things?
So she didn't say anything, but instead said, "Chu Chiyi, there's something you accidentally said correctly before: Xiao Yu and I are indeed a sham."
She looked at him and said, "So during this time, I haven't let you be the other woman."
No matter how much torment and hurt they had caused each other in the past, now that things have come to this, she should at least let him know that she had not put him in a despicable position in this matter.
But he didn't seem to care, and instead asked directly, "But now he thinks he's serious?"
Mu Jia was stunned for a moment. He was indeed smart, too smart.
Being with someone like that means you don't need to spell anything out or do anything to the end. He understands you with just a glance, a gesture, or even a single interjection.
Isn't this one of the important reasons why they were so compatible in some aspects in the past?
Since things had come to this, she chose to go along with him and say, "No matter what, if I want to move forward, I have to clear up all the past issues, otherwise it's not fair to anyone."
The man opposite her stared intently at her, and she used the word "clean up".
"I can! I like you!"
He said it out loud, and even he was surprised, as it wasn't as obscure and difficult as he had imagined.
Mu Jia was stunned for a moment, staring at him intently.
He continued to look at her with red eyes, and after a long while, he saw her suddenly smile: "Don't lie to me, I know what you're thinking."
Even if it was something he usually discarded and disdained.
What other possibilities are there? Why did he have to say it now of all times?
A confession from someone who doesn't love you can be an attempt to win you back, a gesture of possession, or a gesture of habit, but it can never be genuine liking or love.
Thinking of this, she gave another sad laugh.
It is definitely laughable, isn't it?
"Chu Chiyi, standing still and waiting isn't a good feeling. The feeling of the progress bar advancing one notch and then regressing three is also very unpleasant..."
"I used to believe that liking and loving could be cultivated, but later I realized I was wrong. You can never teach someone who doesn't know how to love to love. Or rather, you can never teach someone who doesn't know how to love to love you."
"So, that's it." She looked up at the man opposite her, leaving with her final words, "Please throw away my things in the house."
After saying that, she turned around and left.
Chu Chiyi stood there, watching Mu Jia's departing figure.
He had been through a lot, but he had never felt so pitiful.
Lu Siming had warned him long ago that Mu Jia's affection might only last three minutes.
But he never expected that when it came to her, he would fail before he even got started, unable to truly possess her for even a minute.
He didn't seem to hear her last few words clearly because his mind was blank and buzzing.
That's the animal activating its unique self-protection mechanism, instinctively refusing to receive input that is too harmful.
In a daze, I suddenly heard what sounded like a cat meowing not far away.
His consciousness began to blur, and he didn't know if it was a hallucination, but he knew that he remembered the cat that he and Mu Jia used to feed together.
He felt that he was a bit like that cat, and in his daze he couldn't help but think wildly, did that cat also suffer from the long-term "abandoned cat effect" like him before it was abandoned by its original owner?
Mu Jia walked forward without looking back, but her steps suddenly slowed down slightly because of a cat's meow.
A long time ago, in this same neighborhood, she and Chu Chiyi often fed a stray cat together.
The black and white cat didn't have a name. She named it Mimi because it called her "Mimi" when it first met her.
Later, she confessed her feelings to him, but he rejected her, and they stopped communicating for a while.
Later, although she stopped contacting him, she still secretly came to the neighborhood a few months later, bringing cod-flavored cat treats that Mimi liked.
But Mimi disappeared, and no matter how hard she searched, she could never find her again.
A few years later, she was going to work abroad. Before leaving, she bought a dog to keep her grandmother company.
For some reason, when naming the dog, she inexplicably called her "Mimi".
Chu Chiyi seemed to have mocked her, saying that she couldn't keep anything alive for more than a few days.
But the dog was originally meant to be given to her grandmother.
The cat, the cat abandoned her, hiding away so she couldn't find her no matter how hard she tried...
She quickened her pace and continued forward, suddenly feeling as if she were walking lighter and lighter.
I don't know why, but I guess it's because something was left behind.
That's good, from now on I'll be free of worries, she thought.
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