Conseillère militaire et princesse

Chapitre 11

Who is it?

"A child is still making a fuss downstairs! He insists on going to the apartment to find his mother."

Who is his mother?

"The tenant across the hall."

It was Kang Hui. Ding Yan perked up immediately upon hearing this. Like all girls her age, she was full of curiosity about her surroundings. She changed her shoes and headed straight for the elevator. If she wasn't mistaken, it must be the child from the TV show.

Sure enough, the child was kneeling in front of Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi, crying and pleading, "Please, let me go in and find my mother..."

Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi hurriedly hid on either side like they were plagued by a plague, neither of them willing to accept his generous gift.

Xiao Jia said, "How could you kowtow to a dog?"

Xiao Yi said, "We asked the resident you mentioned, and she doesn't know you!"

"No! She's deliberately saying she doesn't know me! I didn't mistake her for someone else. Do you think I don't even recognize my own mother?"

"How do you know she's your mother?" Ding Yan asked.

When Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi saw Ding Yan, it was as if they had seen a savior. They immediately bowed and stood behind her.

"She looks exactly like my mom, and they even have moles on their necks!" The little boy, seeing that the young woman seemed to be in charge, spoke even louder, "If you don't believe me, I'll show you a picture of me and my mom!"

The little boy stretched out his hand: "Look! Look!"

The photo shows three people: a little boy, Kang Hui (whose mole is in the same spot), and a little girl who looks two years younger than the boy and is crying her eyes out in the photo.

"What's your name?" Ding Yan asked, seeing that the little boy was still stubbornly holding out his hand. She quickly returned the photo to him.

“Xiao He,” the little boy said, then immediately added, “The other person in the photo is my sister, Xiao Ping.”

"Oh..." Ding Yan also believed that Kang Hui was indeed their mother. Even if she wasn't, she at least knew them, otherwise why would they take pictures together?

"Why didn't your mother want you?" Ding Yan squatted down and wiped his nose. To everyone's surprise, the little boy burst into tears: "From childhood to adulthood, my mother only loved Xiaoping and not me... I... I... After Xiaoping died, my mother disappeared... We searched everywhere but couldn't find her... Now, now, now... Now we've finally found her, but she won't acknowledge me. She really only loved Xiaoping..."

Another child lacking maternal love, just like Ding Yan in his childhood. She sighed and took his hand: "Come upstairs with me and we'll talk it over. Maybe I can help you!"

"Huh?!" The little boy stopped crying. "Go in? Are you really letting me in, Auntie?"

Ding Yan turned her head, frowned, and said unhappily, "Call me 'elder sister'!"

"But Auntie..."

"If you call me 'Auntie' again, you can cry yourself to death at the door!" Ding said with disgust.

"Oh...I understand...Sister..."

10.

Xiao He sat on the sofa, eating candy while fiddling with the Buddha statue on his chest.

"Alright, tell me, what exactly happened?" Ding Yan shoved the old postman behind the curtains, quietly preventing him from coming out, before sitting down opposite Xiao He and asking him softly.

"My mother... my mother is a bad person!" Seeing that someone was willing to stand up for him, Xiao He's tone became much harsher than before, and his words were full of hatred: "Ever since Xiaoping came into the world, she not only stopped breastfeeding me, but also started to ignore me. She only has eyes for Xiaoping! Sometimes when Xiaoping and I quarrel, she always sides with her, only hitting and disciplining me, but never disciplining her!"

"Get to the main point!" Ding Yan didn't want to listen to a child rambling on about his trivial matters.

"Fortunately, Dad always stands up for me and often beats Mom. But even when Xiaoping wasn't around, they often fought." Xiao He peeled another piece of candy and put it in his mouth as he spoke.

"And then?" Ding Yan continued to ask.

"Later...later...later..." Perhaps because she was chewing candy, Xiaohe stammered, "Later, Xiaoping finally died..."

"Finally?!" Ding Yan retorted, she was good at assuming the worst of others. "Go on."

“I originally thought that with Xiaoping dead, Mom would belong to me alone… But… Mom didn’t want us anymore… We can’t find her anymore… We tried so many things, but we couldn’t find her. Then, an uncle who knew Mom before said that Mom was in this city and lived here. Auntie…”

Ding Yan glared at him, then gave the old postman, who was hiding behind the curtains and snickering, a vicious glare.

Xiao He covered her mouth and whispered, "Sister, you live here too. Have you met my mother?"

Ding Yan remained silent.

"If you see your mother, you must tell her that Xiaohe knows she was wrong and will never be naughty again. She will definitely be a good girl. Dad also said he won't argue with her anymore. Please tell her to come back soon!" As he spoke, tears welled up in his eyes again, and snot trickled down to his mouth.

"By the way, is your mother a painter?"

"No! My mother works as a handyman at the temple. She often washes clothes or cooks for the monks."

"I see..." Ding Yan pondered. Then Kang Hui probably wasn't her mother; perhaps she just looked similar.

It's impossible for a janitor in a temple to paint such a good picture.

11.

As the day of the funeral drew closer, Kang Hui's condition deteriorated further.

She often felt short of breath in her dreams and frequently saw another woman in the mirror. That woman lay alone on a dirty bed, her eyes filled with loneliness and despair. Every time she dreamed of that woman, she felt uneasy, guilty, and fearful.

She decided to call her boyfriend, who was living abroad, and ask him to come back quickly and be by her side. Although they had broken up three years ago, she still firmly believed that he would help her.

“Lan Ming, it’s me,” she said.

"Xiao Hui!" the other person exclaimed on the phone, "How...how...I was just about to board the plane, I'll be going home soon! Xiao Hui! Is it really you?"

"Lan Ming, what's wrong?"

"Xiao Hui! Xiao Hui... I just received... news of your suicide attempt... You haven't contacted me for the past three years since we broke up... I didn't know you were suffering so much... No! You're not dead, are you? Are you?"

"Of course I'm not dead! Did you receive that notification too? I also received an email that told me to attend my own funeral!"

"What happened? What happened?" Lan Ming asked anxiously on the other end.

"Sigh...it's a long story..."

"Okay, then we'll talk when we meet. I'm boarding now, hanging up! See you at the funeral!" Lan Ming's last sentence was clearly ill-considered, which sounded very strange to Kang Hui. See you at the funeral? Since they knew she wasn't dead, why would there be a funeral?

Kang Hui held the phone, shook her head, and smiled sweetly—he's still so oblivious!

She and Lan Ming fell in love in high school. At that time, they attended the same boarding school. He was cheerful and strong, and often encouraged her and made her happy.

She closed her eyes and drifted into memories.

The memories are sweet, but there's a shadow in them. It seems that every moment she spent with him, including meeting, watching movies, going on dates, and going on outings, was accompanied by a dark shadow, as if their relationship was always a three-way affair.

Who is the third person? Who is that shadow?

Kang Hui's head began to throb violently again.

She opened her eyes and saw the curtains of the French windows swaying softly. Behind the curtains, there seemed to be a figure, coldly watching her through the thin, semi-transparent lace fabric, like a death god waiting to take her life at any moment.

She rushed over and pulled back the curtains—it was an easel.

The Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva image on the easel is complete, its entire body radiating the light of Buddhahood.

She suddenly felt calm and began to murmur Buddhist scriptures.

Suddenly, she realized that she had never read Buddhist scriptures before, so how could she recite them?!

Kang Hui frantically grabbed her head; she must have gone mad.

Or... was she possessed by a ghost?

12.

Today is the day of the funeral, but Lan Ming's phone has been constantly unreachable, and even when it does connect, no one answers.

Kang Hui suddenly felt lonely, as lonely as a dead person. This loneliness seemed to come from the depths of her being, the loneliness of being abandoned by fate.

And the only one who could alleviate this loneliness was probably Lan Ming.

To see Lan Ming, one must attend his funeral—Kang Hui's own funeral—at the address provided in the email.

Lan Ming said, "See you at the funeral."

Kang Hui thought there wouldn't be a funeral, but she was wrong.

She stood nervously outside the door, listening to the somber, rhythmic funeral music playing inside. Funeral music always has a power to make people weep, but there was no crying in the hall.

Although everyone was dressed in mourning clothes or black, and everyone had a sorrowful expression, Kang Hui, a painter who was good at capturing details, still discovered that behind their sorrow lay a stronger emotion, an emotion that could be described as "a sense of relief".

Is it true that both one's own life and the lives of others are a burden?

Kang Hui looked at the woman in the black and white photograph. That woman wasn't her; it was someone else. She felt a sense of relief. It turned out it was just a coincidence of names. She smiled, but immediately stopped, because she saw Lan Ming.

She saw that Lan Ming was the only person crying in the entire auditorium. She saw Lan Ming kneeling in front of the coffin of the woman who was also named Kang Hui, sobbing uncontrollably, and saying between sobs that Xiao Hui was not dead because they had just spoken on the phone yesterday.

What a thick-skinned idiot!

Kang Hui walked over gently and patted him on the shoulder. "Fool! I'm not dead."

Lan Ming abruptly stopped crying, but dared not turn around, only saying, "Xiao Hui? Xiao Hui?"

"Yes, it's Xiao Hui." After Kang Hui finished speaking, the entire hall immediately fell silent, followed by intermittent whispers.

Lan Ming slowly turned around, then suddenly stood up, shaking off Kang Hui's hand. "Don't make jokes like this in front of someone who's already dead! You're not Xiao Hui at all!"

Kang Hui was stunned and couldn't help but take a step back. "Yes, it's me! I'm Xiao Hui! I'm Kang Hui! Have you forgotten? I'm your beloved Xiao Hui!"

"You're a lunatic!" Lan Ming said coldly.

"I really am Xiaohui! Have you forgotten when we first met, you kicked a soccer ball in my face, making my face swollen for days? And once when we went to the movies, you had diarrhea and had to keep running to the toilet. On the way back, you were so dazed that you sat in the wrong seat and kissed a strange girl. You were arrested as a pervert!"

Lan Ming was stunned. What this strange woman said was true. The key point was that her voice was exactly the same as Xiao Hui's. The tone and the intonation were exactly the same.

Kang Hui gripped Lan Ming's shoulders and continued, "And, and, our first kiss was in the boys' restroom..."

"Are you really Xiao Hui?" Lan Ming looked at her in disbelief. Only he and Xiao Hui knew about their first kiss.

"Yes! Yes! I'm your Xiao Hui!" Kang Hui threw herself into his arms, and the murmurs from the crowd grew louder.

Some people say, could it be that Xiao Hui's soul has possessed this woman?

13.

Lan Ming looked down at the woman in his arms. A familiar soul danced in a strange body, her hair, her neck...

Suddenly, he shoved her out of his arms, grabbed her shoulders, and exclaimed, "You're Yao Ying! No doubt about it! That mole... there's no mistake! Yao Ying!"

After Lan Ming said that, several people chimed in, "Yeah! No wonder it looked so familiar..."

"It's Yao Ying...we were high school classmates..."

"Yes, she's Kang Hui's best friend...they're always inseparable..."

"I heard that she was later forced to marry by her father and even took over his business of spreading Buddhist teachings..."