The Heiress's Game

When Jin Wei came out of the operating room, it was raining in Dahai City.

The rain was light, fine and dense, like countless needles falling from the sky and piercing the glass dome of the hospital, making a rustling sound.

She was pushed to the ward door in a wheelchair by the nurse. Pei Yan stood at the end of the corridor, leaning against the wall, his hands hanging at his sides, clenching into fists and then relaxing.

The moment he saw her, his eyes reddened—tears welled up unexpectedly, dripping down his chin and onto his shirt collar.

He walked over and knelt in front of her wheelchair, holding her hands in his own. Her hands were icy cold, and his hands were trembling.

"sorry."

"Weiwei, I'm sorry—we'll have children in the future, I swear, we'll have children again—"

Jin Wei looked down at him. She wanted to say something, but her throat felt like it was stuffed with a wad of water-soaked cotton. All the words were stuck there, and she couldn't squeeze out a single one.

She simply withdrew her hand from his palm, gently placed it on his hair, and stroked it.

His hair was soft, just like she remembered. The first time she touched his hair was in the library of Liqun University. He was asleep on the table, and she reached out and touched it without thinking. He woke up, looked up at her, and both of them blushed.

She was eighteen years old then, and she is twenty-eight this year. She has been living in Dahai City for a full ten years.

Ten years is enough to smooth out the retroflex consonants in Yunzhou dialect, enough for her to get used to the damp cold of southern winters and the endless typhoons of summer, and enough for her to think that she and this city have grown some kind of root.

But under the pale lights of the hospital corridor, she finally understood—those roots had never penetrated the soil; they were merely floating in the air around Pei Yan, living on his breath alone.

His breathing never belonged to himself.

After being discharged from the hospital, Jin Wei did only one thing: she cleaned up her belongings in the villa on the hillside.

She placed the check the Pei family had given her on the dining table, pressing one corner down with her coffee cup. The amount field was blank; she hadn't filled in a single word.

Her family wasn't exactly wealthy, but they never needed to rely on charity to make a living.

The breakup message was sent before boarding the plane. There was no long explanation, no accusations, no explanations—she didn't need explanations, and neither did Pei Yan.

When the plane landed in Yunzhou, it was raining there as well.

Unlike the rain in Dahai City, the rain in Yunzhou is soft, falling on your face like a cool mist, without that aggressive, intrusive feeling.

She sat in the taxi, watching the familiar streets outside the window recede frame by frame—the plane trees on Jiefang Road were a size thicker than when she left, and the rice noodle shop in front of the No. 2 Middle School was still there, with the proprietress standing at the door picking vegetables, half of her hair white.

Looking at the street scenes, she suddenly felt very calm, like she had finally collapsed on the floor of her own living room after running a long marathon outside. Her muscles were sore all over, but she felt at peace.

She did not go back to her parents' house.

Her family owns several houses in Yunzhou, one of which is in the new district. Her father bought it a few years ago intending to rent it out. It's over 70 square meters, with two bedrooms and a living room. The community has osmanthus trees and a small pond that can only be considered for landscaping. The property management company is the one with the best reputation in the area.

She didn't tell her parents she was back; she just wanted to be alone for a while.

Pei Yan found her on the fourth day after she returned to Yunzhou.

She didn't know how he found her—he probably made every phone call he could and asked everyone he could.

She moved in using her own name, which wasn't difficult for him to find.

Someone knocked on the door in the evening. She thought it was the property management coming to collect the water bill, so she went to open the door wrapped in an old sweater.

The moment the door opened, Pei Yan stood under the dim hallway light, looking thinner and with eyes as red as if he had been working overtime for a whole month without sleep.

Jin Wei gripped the door frame, her fingers slowly tightening.

She thought she could hold back her tears. She didn't cry on the plane, she didn't cry in the taxi, and she didn't cry while tidying up her apartment.

But the moment she saw Pei Yan, she felt like a piece of shattered glass, with all the fragments falling to the ground at once.

Then the two of them stepped forward at the same time, hugged each other, and cried bitterly.

Pei Yan bent over and buried his face in her shoulder, crying like a child abandoned by the whole world.

He cried and kept saying sorry, saying he didn't want to break up, sorry, sorry, sorry—she didn't know how many times he said sorry.

All she knew was that his tears had soaked the collar of her old sweater, and the warm tears streamed down her collarbone, burning her heart.

Pei Yan did not leave for the next few days.

He gets up at six o'clock every morning to go to the market to buy an old hen, squats in the kitchen to pluck its feathers and chop it into pieces, and stews a pot of golden chicken soup.

He can't cook. The first soup he made was greasy, he forgot to add salt, and he almost burned the pot dry.

Jin Wei took a sip and laughed. This was the first time she had laughed since she came back. She laughed at him for still being the same Pei Yan who could even burn fried rice.

He saw her smile and smiled back, but as he smiled, his eyes welled up with tears, and he quickly bent down to wash the dishes.

He helped her wash her clothes, saying he would do it from now on.

Jin Wei stopped laughing halfway through, because both of them knew how soft those words were.

He would also make her brown sugar water, buy mugwort foot bath packets from the pharmacy, and mop the floors of her apartment again and again.

He filled the refrigerator with red dates, goji berries, longan, and brown sugar, and replaced all the thin pajamas in her wardrobe with thicker fleece ones, because winters in Yunzhou are much colder than in Dahai City.

One afternoon, when the sun was shining, he helped her take a walk downstairs in the neighborhood.

The two sat on the bench under the osmanthus tree for a long time, her head resting on his shoulder, sunlight filtering through the leaves and falling on their clasped fingers.

He suddenly said, "Weiwei, doesn't this remind you of when we first got together?"

Jin Wei didn't say anything, she just squeezed his hand tighter.

At that moment, she really wanted to pretend that nothing had happened, to pretend that the child was still there.

Pretend they're just going back to Yunzhou for a short vacation, and that they'll be returning to Dahai City in a few days, back to that hillside villa with a view of Victoria Harbour at night, to continue being the couple everyone envies.

But she knew that wasn't the case.

Late that night, Pei Yan was washing dishes in the kitchen. Jin Wei nestled on the sofa, watching his back as he wore that crooked apron, head down, diligently washing the dishes, and suddenly felt that she could remember this scene for a lifetime.

Late that night, Pei Yan was washing dishes in the kitchen.

Jinwei nestled on the sofa, watching his back as he tied that crooked apron and bent over, diligently washing the dishes. Suddenly, she felt that she could remember this scene for a lifetime.

Just then, her phone, which was on the coffee table, suddenly vibrated, the screen lit up, and a text message popped up on the lock screen.

The sender's name froze her fingers in mid-air—Madam Pei.

The message was brief, and the wording remained polite.

"Miss Jin, how are you recovering? Ah Yan has been staying with you for quite a while now."

His father was already very unhappy; there was a mountain of backlogged work at the company, and many things at home were also waiting for him to handle.

He's a very loyal and affectionate person; he won't leave unless you ask him to.

You're a sensible girl; you know exactly what to do.

Jin Wei held her phone and turned to look at Pei Yan's back in the kitchen—he had finished washing the dishes and was wiping the stove with a rag. He was wiping very carefully, and although his movements were still clumsy, they were much more efficient than before.

Her tears slid down silently, but she didn't make a sound.

She was very familiar with this scene—the first time Pei Yan took her to see that villa halfway up the mountain, she stood in the empty living room, looking at the overwhelming sea view outside the window, and thought the same thing: none of this is mine, I just borrowed it.

Now she knows that he isn't hers either.

Jin Wei did not show this message to Pei Yan.

She realized that they had known where he was all along.

That's true. If the Pei family wanted to find someone, they wouldn't have to put in much effort in Dahai City, let alone Yunzhou.

They didn't come to her door directly, which was already a way of giving her some dignity.