In a high-end hospital room in northern Beijing, Su Jinle lay with her eyes closed, listening to the chatter of the nurses outside.
“The one inside is Professor Gu’s wife. Be careful, all of you. Don’t think just because she can’t speak that she isn’t precious!”
“Professor Gu is a big name in academia. Who would have thought his wife is not only mute but also an uneducated housewife?”
“Really? Then why did Professor Gu marry her in the first place?”
“Shh, keep your voices down!”
…
The voices outside gradually faded until they were no longer audible.
Su Jinle smiled bitterly to herself. Yes, why would the great Professor Gu marry her? She had always believed it was because he loved her, but only now did she realize that it had all been a joke.
She had been gentle and soft-spoken her entire life, yet this time she was hospitalized because of a sudden surge of anger. Even now, with her eyes closed, she could still recall the heart-wrenching words from that diary.
“You and I are destined to be impossible, but she resembles you just enough to unsettle my heart.”
She had borne him children, cared for his parents, and pretended to be mute in public for his sake all these years, only to end up as nothing more than a substitute!
A substitute! She had thought he loved her so deeply that he would marry a stutterer. She had been grateful to him, loving him with all her heart and soul.
And what was the result? How laughable, how absurd!
At this thought, Su Jinle couldn’t help but laugh out loud. Tears welled up in the corners of her wrinkled eyes. Gu Jingxiu, if you wanted to be devoted, why did you have to involve me? Just because I bore some resemblance to his beloved, was I destined for this fate?
Silently covering her face, Su Jinle waited a moment before ringing the bell by her bedside. A young nurse hurried in. “Auntie, what do you need?”
As she spoke, she instinctively glanced at the paper and pen in Su Jinle’s hands, waiting for her to write. All the nurses here knew that Professor Gu’s wife couldn’t speak and communicated through notes. Though it was time-consuming, since she was staying in a high-end room, they had no choice but to serve her patiently.
But Su Jinle didn’t write anything. Instead, she slowly opened her mouth and spoke, word by word: “Wa-ter.”
“Huh?” The nurse was startled by her voice, her eyes widening as if she had seen a ghost. With great effort, she managed to hold back the question: Aren’t you mute?
How could a mute suddenly start speaking?
Su Jinle glanced at her. “Go.”
Finally snapping out of her shock, the nurse stumbled as she rushed out, nearly tripping in her haste. Once outside, she stammered to the head nurse, “Professor Gu’s wife can speak!”
Back in the room, Su Jinle let out a long sigh. She hadn’t meant to scare anyone, but after pretending for a lifetime, she no longer wanted to keep up the act.
She wasn’t mute—she just stuttered. But every time Gu Jingxiu heard her speak haltingly, he would frown with impatience. As his status rose higher and higher, she began to feel that her stuttering would embarrass him, so she stopped speaking in public altogether.
Over time, people assumed she was mute.
She thought it was just as well. A mute might earn pity, but a stutterer would only invite ridicule.
For decades, she hadn’t uttered a word in front of outsiders. Yet, in that diary, he had written: “Her voice doesn’t sound like yours at all. It’s better that she doesn’t speak—I don’t want to hear her voice.”
The door to the room swung open. The person who entered wasn’t the young nurse but Gu Jingxiu, dressed in a Zhongshan suit.
He was extremely well-maintained, though nearing sixty, his demeanor was distinguished. Wearing a pair of gold-rimmed glasses and holding a cup of warm water, his tone was indifferent: “People outside are all discussing the fact that you can speak. Why did you suddenly start talking?”
Su Jinle had always been gentle, but this time her words were sharp: “Professor Gu, am I a mute?”
She stammered through the sentence without much force, only staring intently at him.
Gu Jingxiu frowned slightly: “Does it matter? Others think so anyway.”
Su Jinle took the water cup from his hand and threw it fiercely to the ground. She spoke word by word: “We are getting a divorce!”
This time, Gu Jingxiu finally lost his composure. He grabbed her wrist, his tone turning much colder: “What are you making a fuss about? Is it because of that diary? Su Jinle, go look in the mirror and see how old you are this year! Still trying to compete for attention like a young girl?”
“Divorce? You don’t even have a pension. What will you live on after the divorce?”
Su Jinle struggled but couldn’t break free. Without thinking, she lowered her head and bit the back of his hand, her attitude resolute: “Divorce!”
Gu Jingxiu never expected his wife, who had been gentle and obedient her whole life, who loved him as if her life depended on it, to demand a divorce at this age over a diary!
Frustrated, he took off his glasses and couldn’t help but sneer: “Don’t even think about divorce. I can’t bear the shame! What is it you can’t accept? Haven’t I treated you well all my life? Have I ever let you go hungry or thirsty? When you go out, isn’t everyone respectfully calling you Mrs. Gu?”
“Su Jinle, I married you because of Mu Qing, but so what? Haven’t we spent a lifetime together? What are you making a fuss about? I’ve wasted a lifetime on you too!”
After saying this, he took a deep breath and softened his tone: “Jinle, we are destined to be bound together in this lifetime. If you want to leave me, wait for the next life. In the next life, I don’t want to have regrets either.”
He refused to divorce but admitted regretting marrying her. Wasn’t that contradictory?
Su Jinle looked at him coldly: “If you don’t want to be embarrassed, then we’ll go to court. I want a divorce!”
Her relentless attitude finally completely angered Gu Jingxiu. The outwardly refined and elegant professor took two steps toward her, his face darkening: “I said, unless it’s the next life!”
Su Jinle was furious. She was a person with a very gentle temper, but now she was like a madwoman, throwing whatever she could get her hands on. Even the instruments by the hospital bed emitted sharp, piercing beeps. The couple praised by the media as “sharing joys and sorrows” completely tore off their lifelong facade, and the hospital room fell into chaos.
After all, she was old and couldn’t withstand such intense emotional turmoil. Su Jinle suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood and, in a daze, saw Gu Jingxiu’s panicked eyes…
When she opened her eyes again, what she saw was a calendar on the mottled wall, which read May 1, 1984.
She stared in shock at her reflection in the mirror and heard voices coming from the main room outside: “We’re all from the same factory, so this is like adding family ties. Dad, when should we arrange the wedding?”
Su Jinle slowly came back to her senses. She had been reborn on the day the Gu family came to propose marriage.
She remembered clearly how Gu Jingxiu’s parents had acted with such arrogance back then, while she, lost in the excitement of marrying Gu Jingxiu, failed to notice her own parents’ hesitant expressions and eagerly agreed without a second thought.
The words Gu Jingxiu had spoken in her past life seemed to echo in her ears, the yellowed diary vivid in her memory. Without hesitation, Su Jinle slipped on her shoes and rushed out of the room, declaring loudly, “I won’t marry.”
Everyone outside who had been talking fell silent. Her gaze swept past both sets of parents and locked with the man sitting at the far end.
Gu Jingxiu’s expression was inscrutable. After a long pause, a flicker of mockery flashed in his eyes. “If that’s the case, then forget it.”
The young Gu Jingxiu had never worn such an expression before. Having spent most of their lives as husband and wife, they understood each other well enough.
Su Jinle calmly met his gaze. In that moment, she knew—he had also been reborn.