It rained all night, and I stood under the streetlight holding the divorce agreement. Shen Zhixia's signature was wrinkled by the rain. It wasn't until the psychological counselor handed over the business card with "Anning Hospital" printed on it that I realized that the woman who "completely ended" with me six months ago had been silently treating depression for three months, and she brought a photo of me with her every time she came.
The terms of the agreement were like a knife tempered with ice: she would voluntarily give up all her property, and if I filed for divorce, she would even give up visitation rights. But when I turned to the pregnancy test report in the mezzanine, my fingertips were still shaking violently. It was the diagnosis made a few days before my grandmother's death. The words about fetal dysplasia were so piercing that it hurt my eyes.
It turned out that she stood outside grandma's funeral all night, it turned out that I kicked her out when she had a fever of 39 degrees, it turned out that she knelt in front of Grandma Lin's house and begged for a photo of me... I didn't know any of this. I only remember that on a rainy night three months ago, she rang the doorbell thirty-seven times outside. I was wrapped in a quilt and pretended not to hear my voice looping through her cell phone.
Lying on the phone were the three words she had just sent: "Thank you."
But I would rather she hate me, hate me for being a fool who was kept in the dark, hate me until she swallowed all the pain in her stomach and saw clearly that the fresh tears on the agreement were like the tears she had hidden for too long and finally dared to fall in front of me.
Is this belated truth the farewell she paid for with half her life, or is it a debt that I cannot redeem for the rest of my life?
