Everything Goes as Sweetly as Persimmons

My name is Changsun Xiwei. I am the youngest daughter of the deputy minister of the Court of State Ceremonial. I have been frail and sickly since childhood, and have taken medicine for years.

After recovering from another serious illness, I noticed that the people around me were no longer as close to me as before. They often wore sorrowful expressions, and would pass by my courtyard now and then without coming in to see me. Instead, they would stop at the gate and look at the persimmon tree Pei Cheng had planted in my courtyard with his own hands.

Seeing the branches laden with fruit, I assumed they must be reluctant to let me marry. Last month, Pei Cheng had sent me a letter through a messenger. He said the persimmons would soon ripen, and that he had earned military honors. He would return this month to marry me, just in time for an auspicious omen of everything going smoothly.

Sure enough, after he returned, he grew much closer to me. He often took me out to have fun and taught me to ride and shoot. Yet the more time we spent together, the more I saw the deep sorrow in his dim eyes.

I raised my hand to his face, smoothing the furrow in his brow, and asked with concern, "Pei Cheng, what's wrong?"

"You Shu, come with me to the frontier. I don't want us to be apart again."

After thinking it over, I nodded. "All right."

.

But on the day Pei Cheng and I were married, the only thing that entered the bridal chamber with me was a spirit tablet covered in red cloth.

Terrified, I secretly lifted one corner of the cloth. I caught sight of the words "beloved wife" on the tablet before Pei Cheng suddenly appeared and stopped me.

He stood behind the door in his wedding robes, yet there was not a trace of joy on his face. His expression was grief-stricken. In a choked, pleading voice, he said, "You Shu, don't look..."

Theme: There is no dead end ahead; hope is just around the corner