Chapter 22: I Regret It Part 3

“Probably.” Li Wuhui responded absentmindedly.

She didn’t understand why Feng Yu had to abandon her wife on a day like this to come find her, as if she were some lonely widow who needed looking after or else she’d hang herself.

It was New Year’s Eve back home. Even with a seven-hour time difference, the Chinese restaurants in Paris had been packed since noon.

They didn’t join the bustle and simply ate a few bland French dishes in the hotel.

A few hours later, Li Wuhui got on the treadmill.

Feng Yu sprawled bored on the carpet, watching her sweat profusely as she ran facing the glass window, while also admiring her own beautiful reflection in the glass.

“Seriously, I’m even starting to miss Qiu Yiran.” Feng Yu said suddenly.

Li Wuhui didn’t stop and kept running at a steady pace.

“When she was around before, even with the time difference, our New Year’s Eves weren’t this quiet, right? I remember she really liked learning to cook, especially Chinese food.”

“If she were here, we’d just be sitting down to eat about now—you prepped the ingredients, she cooked, and I washed the dishes…”

“Then she’d video call with her whole big family, we’d join in, and listen to the firecrackers back home…”

At this point, Feng Yu took a sip of red wine, sounding pensive, like she regretted it.

“Actually, she used to be someone who really loved life.”

Li Wuhui glanced faintly at her. “You’ve had too much to drink.”

“Is that so?” Feng Yu rubbed her temple; she really was starting to get a headache.

“So you’re really flying back home first, then driving to Paris with Qiu Yiran for the divorce? Going through all this trouble just to get her to come back?”

To be honest, even she didn’t understand why Li Wuhui had proactively proposed divorcing Qiu Yiran this time.

Some people said the key to maintaining a healthy intimate relationship was not fearing separation. But for Li Wuhui, separation had never been an option.

She hadn’t accepted her mother Lu Yun wanting to face death alone at the end of her life, nor Feng Yu trying to give up Paris and move back home one year, and certainly not Qiu Yiran’s departure.

She was obsessive, refused to lose, and always clung to everything she could grasp, even if it left her bloodied.

She hated everyone who left her and never let anyone who left her go free.

Feng Yu had advised Li Wuhui many times—stop obsessing, stop chasing after every person who vaguely resembled her, stop hating. In the end, it only tortured herself.

But nothing worked.

“Sometimes when I look back, I feel like it was me who ruined you.” Feng Yu pulled herself from her thoughts. Perhaps the New Year’s Eve wine made her melancholic.

“If it weren’t for me back then, you wouldn’t have…”

“Won’t have what?” Li Wuhui cut her off but then answered herself with a light chuckle. “You’re overthinking it.”

Feng Yu froze.

“You’re overthinking it, Feng Yu.”

Li Wuhui repeated.

She stepped off the treadmill. Her face reflected in the glass window was half-lit, half-shadowed, its expression unreadable.

“Even without you back then, I still would’ve fallen in love with Qiu Yiran.”

She said this very calmly, as if she had fully accepted the fact.

Feng Yu even forgot to ask—what about now?

“So this time…”

Feng Yu hesitated before speaking. “Is it to get her back by your side?”

“No.” On this point, Li Wuhui denied it resolutely.

“I’m serious about divorcing her.”

This truly caught Feng Yu off guard.

Because she had always thought—only if one of them died would Li Wuhui finally let Qiu Yiran go, ending things for good.

“Of course, I also want her to come back to Paris.”

Paris’s winter evenings lit up as the splendid lights came on. Li Wuhui didn’t smile; her voice drifted.

“Even if it’s a Paris without me.”

–

Fake Paris was a rundown little city far down the tier list. On New Year’s Eve, the fireworks and firecrackers went on endlessly, lasting until dawn.

Qiu Yiran couldn’t sleep that night.

Thinking she might soon head out on a long trip, she simply got up to pack her luggage.

Considering her leg condition and any potential accidents along the way, the plan was for a one-month journey, but it crossed so many countries, so she ended up packing a lot.

She definitely couldn’t take it all in the car.

So after packing, she had to start trimming it down.

This turned her rental apartment into a total mess, even unearthing something she shouldn’t have at a time like this—

A ring.

They were supposed to have matching wedding rings.

But things had been too rushed back then, and neither had thought of it.

Later mishaps delayed it further.

Until her accident happened. Probably out of the same sentiment, Li Wuhui not only engraved those words on her prosthetic leg but also gave her this ring to make up for it.

She should have believed then that Li Wuhui’s love was deep enough. But she had been in too much pain at the time, always struggling to tell how much of it was compensation and guilt.

The moment she unearthed it now, Qiu Yiran’s heart raced. The ring was like a mountain of memories crashing down, clamping her flesh and bones so tightly that she couldn’t move for an instant.

She summoned all her willpower to hurl the ring far away—

Then gasped heavily for two breaths.

She struggled in the dimly lit rental apartment to search for it.

No matter what, this was proof that she had once loved and been loved. She shouldn’t just throw it away.

Unfortunately, rings were tiny things.

After throwing it…

She searched for a long time, practically moving everything in the cramped apartment.

Finally, with firecrackers booming outside, she lay on the floor and reached under the bed to grab that unassuming ring.

Only then could she relax. The sweat on her back had cooled by half, but she still clutched the ring tightly in her hand.

Then the phone rang.

She scrambled out from under the bed, covered in dust and grime. All the furniture and luggage waited amid the mess for cleanup. She found her phone and answered—

No one spoke on the other end for a long time.

Exactly like last time.

Qiu Yiran froze. Sweat trickled into her eyes, stinging them, while the ring she’d finally retrieved dug painfully into her palm.

Without checking the number, she spoke first.

“Li Chunfeng?”

As these words carried over, the firecrackers on her end boomed loudly. Li Wuhui finally responded from the other side, as if waiting for her to call out first.

“Are you guys setting off fireworks over there?”

Her voice sounded off.

“You drinking?”

Though she asked, Qiu Yiran still leaned against the window to sit, putting the phone on speaker—

To capture the fireworks sounds outside.

Back home, it was popular to set off fireworks and firecrackers at midnight to welcome the God of Wealth. Though big cities had banned it in recent years, many small cities weren’t strict about it.

Back when they were in Paris, they followed home time for New Year’s Eve. After Qiu Yiran finished dinner and video called Lin Manyi for the New Year, she could faintly hear firecrackers from Lin Manyi’s side, back in her rural hometown.

That had been their New Year’s Eve background noise in Paris every year.

When the firecrackers sounded, the year was over.

On the phone, Li Wuhui stayed silent for a long time, as if she’d drunk a lot. Maybe she’d wake up tomorrow morning and not even remember making the call.

Thinking this, Qiu Yiran hadn’t planned to say anything.

But then Li Wuhui spoke first. “Have you gotten all your stuff ready?”

“Pretty much.” Qiu Yiran glanced at the disaster of a rental apartment and asked again,

“When can we set off?”

“In two more days.” Li Wuhui said.

“How long?” Qiu Yiran couldn’t help asking, as if she had always been eager about this.

“You mean you’re ready to go anytime? Or just super eager to divorce me?” Li Wuhui didn’t get angry this time. Instead, she chuckled softly and answered patiently,

“But no matter what you’re thinking, let’s wait until after this Spring Festival.”

“Why?”

After asking, Qiu Yiran realized—maybe Li Wuhui had things to handle these days.

She shouldn’t pry.

But Li Wuhui answered anyway.

“Because I don’t want to have to think about divorcing you every Spring Festival from now on.”

The direct words avoided nothing. “It’d be exhausting and painful.”

Qiu Yiran fell silent because of it.

“This year is already ruined by it…” The firecrackers rose and fell, making Li Wuhui’s voice on the phone sound ethereal.

“But there are so many years ahead. We have to live them well, right?”

Qiu Yiran said nothing.

She had no rebuttal for Li Wuhui.

“So just wait patiently a bit.”

The firecrackers gradually died down. Qiu Yiran gripped the ring tightly. Then Li Wuhui said on the phone,

“Even if you really want to divorce me ASAP.”

–

Qiu Yiran had a hard time sleeping that night.

One reason was the firecrackers didn’t fully stop until three or four in the morning.

The second was that she kept thinking about her final words to Li Wuhui on that call—

The call lasted a long time.

There was a long stretch of stifled silence in the middle.

In the end, Qiu Yiran couldn’t take it and hung up. But before doing so, realizing it was now the Yi Si Snake Year, she mustered her courage to say,

“Happy New Year.”

But after receiving the blessing, Li Wuhui didn’t accept it like a normal person. Instead, she said,

“We’ll see.”

As if she wasn’t sure she could have a happy new year.

Those words kept Qiu Yiran tossing and turning all night—she thought back endlessly to the old Li Wuhui.

She remembered Li Wuhui had been great at making herself happy back then—

Even when poor and down on her luck, she’d teach Qiu Yiran tap dance and cha-cha.

She’d even taught her fist-guessing drinking games. A few times, Qiu Yiran got tipsy and dizzy, and when she opened her eyes, she’d see Li Wuhui grinning slyly while tying a red string around her ankle.

That had been a world Qiu Yiran never knew before.

She never imagined Li Wuhui would become like this.

The next day, she woke early too, roused by the morning firecrackers. After that, Qiu Yiran simply curled up in bed, not knowing how much longer she slept.

When she woke again, sunlight poured in thickly.

She finally felt rested enough. She got up, cleaned herself, and drew the curtains—

New Year’s Day, Spring Festival proper. Red paper from burned fireworks and firecrackers littered the street like ashes, or like rebirth.

The sun blazed, its halo shimmering.

Like a dream, she saw Li Wuhui.

Li Wuhui stood downstairs in a coat and scarf, a suitcase at her feet, looking ready for a long trip—or like the day they first met.

People passed her: big families heading out for New Year’s greetings, mouths full of auspicious words; kids clustered playing with poppers; acquaintances on the road chatting endlessly…

Spring Festival bustled with family reunions as the backdrop.

But Li Wuhui stood alone, adrift amid it all, always gazing up at her from afar.

No telling how long she’d been waiting there.

Qiu Yiran even thought she hadn’t woken from the dream yet.

They’d talked on the phone just before dawn yesterday.

Li Wuhui had clearly still been in Paris, yet less than a day later, here she stood.

She groggily wondered when exactly Li Wuhui had arrived downstairs—

Until Li Wuhui downstairs squinted at her for a moment, then suddenly pulled out her phone and typed something on it.

Qiu Yiran’s phone suddenly vibrated at that moment.

Qiu Yiran froze, took out her phone, and saw the text message that had just arrived—

【Are you awake?】

This was naturally from Li Wuhui standing downstairs.

Qiu Yiran subconsciously glanced at Li Wuhui.

Li Wuhui was still standing there, her entire body bathed in sunlight, her shadow stretched long.

She kept her head down, tapping away on her phone. After a while, she pocketed it, then looked up at Qiu Yiran again.

Without surprise, their gazes collided amid the lingering light of New Year’s first day, fusing into a sticky, gluey mass under the sunlight.

Right then, four text messages arrived in quick succession on Qiu Yiran’s phone, the vibrations making her palm go numb—

【I regret it】

【I still want you to think of me every Spring Festival from now on】

Probably due to a signal glitch, there was a pause of two or three seconds between the first two and the next two—

【Because this Spring Festival, I’m still hating you】

【So you’ll never be able to forget】