Wen Xiaoliang finally had a long, good night’s sleep, but Liang Rou tossed and turned, unable to fall asleep.
“Sigh…”
In the end, Liang Rou decided to just give up on sleeping and sat up to scroll through videos.
What if scrolling made her sleepy? What if it helped her forget all the troubles and let her fall asleep peacefully?
But big data works in a predictable way.
That familiar AI female voice sounded:
“They all say forgetting means no more pain. Perhaps time has never been a match for memories…”
Liang Rou couldn’t listen to the rest of those emo quotes anymore.
Her gaze dulled as she stared blankly at the doro figure on the screen. Somehow, she swiped her phone and opened the one place she had long avoided—the Wen Xiaoliang V Moments.
Pinned at the top was the first post, and it was about her:
“If anyone finds my boyfriend, I will reward you handsomely! No matter how much you want, I can give tens of thousands! Millions… My studio is about to be established soon, and I will definitely have money to give you all! Please, everyone… Even if it means donating a kidney, donating bone marrow… as long as it’s not fatal, it’s fine!”
Tears instantly welled up in her eyes.
Liang Rou wasn’t ungrateful. It was because she had a conscience that her heart ached as if pierced by needles when she saw these words.
“Why does it have to be like this?” she murmured.
Her fingers swiped down.
Every day, Wen Xiaoliang would post an update about searching for her missing boyfriend, always accompanied by a photo—sometimes a picture of the two of them together, sometimes just Wen Xiaoliang alone.
Each photo was different…
Liang Rou was never one to like taking photos, but Wen Xiaoliang loved it.
So Wen Xiaoliang’s phone was packed with over ten thousand pictures of the two of them together.
Wen Xiaoliang said she liked that feeling; every time she looked through the photo album, she felt at peace, happy.
Liang Rou’s heart throbbed painfully again.
She suddenly felt a flicker of confusion.
Was living for herself really the right choice?
Her thoughts drifted back to the day she ran away after becoming a girl.
It was a warm spring afternoon. She couldn’t quite recall whether it was cloudy or sunny that day, but since it was a day of rebirth, the weather had to be perfect.
That day, a person whose face she couldn’t see handed her a bottle of potion and said: “If you want a new life, drink this potion. Once you do, you will have a new identity, a new appearance, a new body… Your girlfriend won’t be able to find you, she won’t be able to find you…”
Her memory of that moment was hazy.
She couldn’t remember what the person’s voice sounded like, why their face was always blurred, or why she trusted that stranger so completely.
Maybe she wasn’t afraid of death. She thought even if the bottle contained poison, if she drank it and died, she would no longer have to endure the pain.
The pain she referred to was this suffocating life.
In her world then, there was only Wen Xiaoliang. No family, no friends—only Wen Xiaoliang.
Family didn’t matter much, but friends had gradually distanced themselves.
Or perhaps she had been tormented to the point she no longer wanted new friends.
She knew Wen Xiaoliang genuinely cared for her, but that terrifying control left her hopeless.
How terrifying was that possessiveness and desire to control?
Even if she petted a stray dog or cat on the street, Wen Xiaoliang would break down and cry.
Whenever Wen Xiaoliang was left without response—whether because of work or school—she would carve wound after wound on her own wrist.
She was a girl with no sense of security. Wen Xiaoliang was her perfect lover, like a giant doll that spoke—she just had to obey her.
But Liang Rou had her own thoughts, her own independent personality, her own free spirit.
She loved Wen Xiaoliang deeply, but she didn’t want a life suffocated like this.
“Rather than like this, it would have been better to die together when she asked me to commit suicide with her that day.”
That was what Liang Rou thought back then.
That way, she wouldn’t have had to suffer the endless loss of friends, jobs, and everything she could have had.
Wen Xiaoliang wouldn’t have repeatedly slit her wrists, swallowed pills, and destroyed herself in revenge.
Wen Xiaoliang always screamed, asking why she didn’t love her.
At times like that, Liang Rou would feel helplessly broken.
She really did love her—so much that Wen Xiaoliang was the only person in her world. Wasn’t that enough? What more did she have to do?
From the moment she met Wen Xiaoliang at fourteen, lived with her at sixteen, confirmed their relationship at eighteen—seven whole years.
She had lived like this for five years. Five whole years! Ever since being together with Wen Xiaoliang, it had been like this!
She… had really had enough.
Even if Wen Xiaoliang stopped self-harming, even if Wen Xiaoliang hit her—it never happened… Wen Xiaoliang always retaliated in the cruelest way possible, forcing her to submit.
She was done.
Love?
Love.
But she couldn’t afford it anymore.
So she took the potion from that person’s hand.
“How long after drinking will it take effect?” Liang Rou asked.
“About three hours. It’s best to act at night. Here, this is for you.”
The blurred figure handed her a packet of powder.
“This is a sleeping potion. You can put it in your girlfriend’s water or food, so when you sneak out at midnight, she won’t notice.”
“Okay.” Liang Rou took the powder and gave the person one last, deep look.
“Thank you. If I have the chance later, I will properly thank you.”
“…”
The blurred figure fell silent for a moment.
For some reason, Liang Rou felt like they smiled.
She didn’t pay it much mind.
She quickly walked home, knowing full well that if she stayed away for more than five minutes, Wen Xiaoliang would break down, thinking she had been abandoned, and burst into hysterical tears.
But recently, Wen Xiaoliang’s emotions had been a bit better, probably because she finally planned to get the Marriage Certificate three days from now… that day was when Wen Xiaoliang planned for the two of them to become truly united.
“I’m sorry, Yan Fu, I don’t want to continue like this anymore…”
She thought to herself, even if it’s poison, she would drink it… as long as it brought relief.
So she went home numb, accepted her girlfriend’s embrace numb, said “I’ll make dinner tonight” numb, and watched Wen Xiaoliang happily sit on the sofa watching anime, occasionally glancing up at her.
What a happy scene…