The police looked at me somewhat amusedly: “Don’t be afraid, it’s not serious. In fact, we’ve received several calls recently about a flasher sexually harassing women near H University. What you did was an act of justice. How could you be detained or disciplined? We’ll contact your school and give you two a commendation flag.”
Leaving the police station, I finally breathed a long sigh of relief.
That was close. In the parallel timeline, was it an incident like this that affected the other Liam’s bright future?
I couldn’t help but look at Liam, only to find him staring intently at me, his expression not quite right.
“What’s wrong?”
“I feel afraid in hindsight,” he rested his chin on my shoulder, his tone self–blaming: “I was the one who told you to wait outside.”
I found him so cute that I couldn’t help but tease him with a straight face: “It is quite serious. I might need a lifetime to heal from that sight.”
Liam’s expression indeed became increasingly grave.
I couldn’t keep it up anymore. I put my hand in his, our hands intertwined, and said: “It seems the only punishment is for you to take me wherever you go for the rest of your life.”
My name is Aria Winters. I’m a designer, and I just celebrated my 28th birthday last week.
The birthday was held at home. To celebrate my birthday and my successful discharge from the hospital, my mom and my friends threw a grand party for me. At the party, an exquisite birthday cake was brought out, and I made a wish and cut the cake surrounded by everyone. While making a wish, my mom whispered beside me: “I hope Aria finds the person who loves her most soon!”
I closed my eyes, tears streaming down my face.
My wish was: I hope the person who loves me most could come back to life.
I’ve been quite lucky in this life. Lucky to be born into a happy and loving family, lucky to get into my dream university, lucky to pursue a career I love.
But a person’s luck is conserved. When I was 18, just starting my freshman year, I met Connor Sullivan, who later became my husband.
Connor appeared gentle, passionate, and considerate in front of me. Whatever I wanted, he would bring it to me.
M
12:12 AM A
<
Connor persistently pursued me for half a year, and I inevitably fell for him. He confessed to me in front of the whole school. Amidst the teasing and blessings from the crowd, a figure rushed out, gripping my wrist with great force, saying he liked me and asking me not to accept
Connor.
I knew him. He seemed to be from the Computer Science department, named Liam Blackwood.
But I had heard that last Christmas, he got into a fight near the school and almost beat someone into the ICU.
People said he had some mental issues.
In any case, being stared at by those dark eyes, I was truly startled.
I rejected him, not because of his physical condition, but simply because I didn’t know him. I liked Connor.
Liam didn’t let go even after I rejected him. In the end, he was pulled away by Connor’s friends. Because of the rumors about his mental illness, everyone was a bit wary, afraid he might suddenly go berserk.
But at that time, he just looked at me, his gaze stubborn, saying nothing. Even as the crowd dispersed and Connor led me away by the hand, I saw in my peripheral vision that he was still standing there, watching me.
After getting together with Connor, he went along with everything I said. Although his family background wasn’t good, my parents unanimously felt that finding someone who treated me well and was ambitious was enough. Our family was quite wealthy, so it wouldn’t be a problem for Connor to be a live–in son–in–law.
I told Connor about this. My intention was to let him know not to feel pressured about marrying me. Our family didn’t need him to contribute any money, loving me was enough.
He smiled and took out an engagement ring he had prepared, proposing to me. I was busy feeling touched and crying, and didn’t notice the flash of humiliation and endurance in his eyes.
I was happy for two years after marriage. Under my dad’s promotion, Connor’s position kept rising. Later, during a company crisis, my dad fell ill with worry, and Connor leaped to become the company’s vice president.
After my dad passed away, Connor became increasingly busy with company social engagements, and his attitude towards me became more and more perfunctory and cold. Once, I found a used condom in his shirt pocket. I was utterly disgusted, threw it in front of him and confronted him. He explained, I cried and made a fuss, and during the argument, he slapped me.
I said, “Connor Sullivan, you’re finished.”
Everything he has now was given by my family. Since we could give, I also had ways to take it back.
He looked like I had caught his weakness, kneeling down and slapping himself twice, saying he would never do it again.
Years of feelings made me choose to believe him.
However, a month later, Connor said he would take me mountain climbing.
It wasn’t until the car drove to the mountaintop, and I felt weak all over, that I realized all this was just his delaying tactic. As he took out a rope from the car, preparing to push me off the cliff, I finally understood that everything was just his act.
The company’s issues were his doing, my dad’s illness wasn’t unrelated to him, he never loved me, all along he just saw me as a stepping stone for his ascent.
In the wilderness, with a cliff behind me and a man who once said he loved me but was now about to kill me for money and status in front of me.
Our strength difference was too great. Ten of me probably couldn’t beat one Connor Sullivan, let alone with my hands and feet tied. I only had the fate of being slaughtered.
I closed my eyes in resignation, but the expected feeling of weightlessness never came.
12:12 AM A
<
Q
I opened my eyes to find Connor already wrestling with someone on the ground. The person straddling him and pummeling his head turned
out to be Liam Blackwood, whom I hadn’t seen in years.
Liam fought with a crazy intensity, as if he was betting his life. In terms of strength, Connor shouldn’t have been able to beat him, but Connor had come prepared to murder me today. Seeing himself at a disadvantage, he actually pulled out a small knife and stabbed it into Liam’s
stomach.
Connor staggered to his feet, looked at me with a strange expression, muttering like a madman: “He really loves you that much, hasn’t given up after all these years.”
Loves me? Who? Liam?
My brain was in a fog. I watched him walk towards me, come to the edge of the cliff. Just as he was about to act, that figure behind him seized the opportunity, rushing up without hesitation. Connor hadn’t expected Liam to have this move left, and both men fell off the cliff together.
Before Liam rushed up, he gave me one deep look.
In this life, I had only made eye contact with him twice. Once at the university gate, when he confessed to me under the name of “psycho“. And now, with several stab wounds in his abdomen, blood flowing freely, but after looking at me once, he unhesitatingly threw himself at Connor, taking the danger away from me.
I was left tied up on the mountaintop. By the time the police came to rescue me, I had already fainted from exhaustion.
When I woke up again, I saw my mom’s worried face. My mom grabbed my hand ecstatically, crying and cursing Connor Sullivan for being inhuman, saying he deserved to die. I closed my eyes and asked, “Mom, what about Liam?”
My mom’s voice suddenly stopped.
After a while, she carefully observed my expression and said in a low voice: “You mean the boy who fell with that beast? When the police found him, he was already…
I suddenly burst into tears.
Later, I learned that no one even came to claim Liam’s body.
His father was missing, and the police couldn’t contact his distant relative for the time being.
On my 28th birthday, I was discharged from the hospital. The first thing I did was go to Liam’s house to sort out his belongings.
I found a wooden box under his bed. When I opened it, on top was a palm–sized notebook.
On the cover was neatly written: “Her”
Inside, it recorded every little detail about me.
He knew I was allergic to pollen, knew I liked the chocolate muffins from a certain store, knew I only drank milk tea with 30% sugar.
At the end of the diary, he wrote: “I’ve been carrying out a secret love throughout my student years. She doesn’t know, it’s okay, someone better than me will come to love her.”
So he really did love me, loved me to the bone yet with restraint.
Under the diary were some miscellaneous small items.
There was a pen I had used up, a half–used pack of tissues, my hair tie, and even a mobile phone.
This was the birthday gift my dad bought me when I first started university, the latest model at the time. It broke in my junior year and I switched to a new one.
I casually threw the broken one into the school’s recycling bin, never expecting it to end up with Liam.
That night Iving in bed. I tried charging the phone and turning it on Surprisingly it worked.
<
That night, lying in bed, I tried charging the phone and turning it on. Surprisingly, it worked.
Amazingly, as soon as I turned it on, before I even inserted a SIM card or connected to the internet, the phone started automatically popping
up messages.
“Aria, aren’t you asleep yet? There’s an 8 AM class with the Department Head tomorrow.”
1
The phone’s system time showed: September 23, 2020.
This was probably the most surreal birthday I’ve ever had.
Perhaps heaven heard my prayer and decided to grant my birthday wish. I, through this ten–year–old phone in my hand, contacted my 18–year–old self.
I told her to stay away from Connor Sullivan, begged her to save Liam. She did it, and even told me she was together with Liam.
At that moment, I really envied her, envied this different 18–year–old me.
The 18–year–old her could date Liam, while the 28–year–old me could only accept this world without Liam’s existence.
Maybe she wasn’t me from ten years ago, maybe she was just an 18–year–old Aria Winters in another parallel universe.
But I still hope that the Aria Winters in this world can find the person who loves her most, and that the Liam in this world suffers fewer
setbacks.
“Wake up.”
In my daze, someone was calling me.
I’ve been physically and mentally exhausted lately, so I buried my head in the quilt and mumbled unclearly: “Five more minutes.”
“…Five more minutes is fine too,” that voice was tinged with laughter, very close, as if right by my pillow, “You said you wanted to try on wedding dresses today. If your eyes get puffy from sleeping, don’t get angry.”
I abruptly opened my eyes. Liam’s enlarged face was right in front of me.
Those eyes that were always dark and struggling were now curved into two small crescents. Liam poked my nose with a finger: “Mom and Dad are waiting downstairs, to see how long you’ll sleep.”
I remembered that Liam and I had been dating for seven years. We met each other’s parents in the second year. My parents were very satisfied with him, saying they could support us in our careers, but he said he wanted to be able to support me himself before he could marry
- me.
Now, Liam has established his own company with software he developed. Every month, he transfers all the money he earns to my account without keeping a cent. He carries me wherever he goes. Our friends say he’s raising me like a daughter. Even my parents think so, always telling him not to spoil me too much.
Today is the day we’re going to choose wedding dresses. I did a fish flop on the bed and threw a tantrum: “Why didn’t you wake me up earlier!”
Liam pulled up the quilt, covering my shoulders, and laughed into the quilt: “I’m kidding. Mom and Dad haven’t arrived yet. We’ll go in the afternoon. Now you can sleep for… let me think, twenty more five–minute intervals. I’ll count for you.”
“Or you can kiss me once, and I’ll deduct one count.”
Liam who likes to tease me is so annoying. Don’t you know you might lose me like this?
I hugged his neck and kissed his face exactly twenty times.
Hehe, my own fiancé, bribed fair and square.
