Warm Jade

When Wen Nuan met Xu Pei at the antique shop, he was warming a chipped piece of ancient jade with his fingertips.

"This jade is like you." When he looked up, a river of stars seemed to spill from his eyes. "So cold, it makes me want to warm you up."

After that, he would hold Wen Nuan's trembling body close in the dead of night. "You'll be all right once you warm up, Nuan Nuan..."

Until the night chemotherapy made all his hair fall out, Wen Nuan felt the jade he had newly hidden beneath the pillow. It was smooth and whole now, engraved with the words "Together in life and death."

Xu Pei smiled through red-rimmed eyes. "Antique restorers are best at mending what is broken. This time, let me mend you."

But jade can be repaired. How can fate be mended?

When the first snow fell after Wen Nuan's funeral, Xu Pei sat at the restoration table, his hair as white as frost. The jade beneath the lamp was still warm, but there was no one left who needed its warmth.

.

.

.

Theme: Love your beloved as you would tend a flower