On that day, Zhang Mei Xing did everything she could to make herself and her loved ones happy. Within an hour, she cooked something for her family. As her younger self was somebody who feared cooking oil and hated the heat, her parents were naturally baffled. But she was too elated to mind their odd stares as she presented the cooked pastries to them.
'What happened to this girl?'
'Did somebody feed her some strange medicine?'
Zhang Mei Xing perceived those words from their silent exchanges of stares. However, she only smiled like a flower. Who cares if they thought of her as weird? She was happy. And she too could see that they despite their doubts, the edges of their lips were rising from time to time.
The girl could feel that this might be her last chance to be with them, so she had no time to pay attention to customs or behaviors. Only when one knew how important something was would they know that they should cherish it.
When her younger sister who was in elementary came back, she teased and played with her. The little girl's name was Zhang Bi, was four years younger than her, and was still cute. After a few more years though, her sister would grow into a self-conscious beauty so there would be no more opportunities to play around with her.
'Although it's not like I can still wait for her to grow up again,' she helplessly laughed while shaking her head.
Before night fully descended, Zhang Mei Xing ordered a fairly sumptuous meal set from a locally famous food house twenty minutes away using all of her savings. How proud she was to make the jaws of her family members drop to the ground.
These were all small things. Nonetheless, it brought her joy. And she believed her happiness was spreading to them.
She never felt so fulfilled and content. Gratitude towards the kind being who gave her this opportunity.
More than the illusion of being somebody who had broken the notion 'time was a river with water that could only be touched once', she appreciated more how the fact that she was given a chance to see her loved ones again… To experience being very happy again.
Unfortunately, all good things had to come to an end.
Just like that, the twelve midnight came.
It was naturally dark outside. Three hours ago, Zhang Mei Xing pretended to have gone to sleep when her parents checked on her even though in reality, she was still wide awake. In fact, she had no plan to sleep, anxiously waiting for time to pass.
Zhang Mei Xing knew the concept of reincarnation but she kept insisting to herself that there was no way what she was experiencing was that.
The reason for this was simple. Whenever she closed her eyes, she would see an hourglass, one with an appearance that said it was antique. The sand inside kept falling down, and in her estimate, it would become completely empty before twelve o'clock.
Her eyes were on her old model phone, watching as the analog clock which functioned as its screensaver paused.
The shorter hand stayed still, the larger hand did as well.
'As expected.' A soft smile appeared on her face. A smile that if one would take a look at closely, would appear sadder second after second.
She felt the changes in her surroundings. Everything seemed to have been frozen in time. She felt that she lost something.
So even though there was no bitterness in her expression, there was a trace of regret in her eyes. Regret that the time given to her seemed so little.
The feeling was ugly but if one would think about it, it was normal for Zhang Mei Xing to feel like this as she was but a regular human being. Even if she reached the age to act mature, she was still not immune to the delusion, or more specifically, greed for 'maybes' and 'ifs'. After all, her brain was still fully functional and she could think of the numerous possibilities that could have happened if she didn't die.
'Sighs.'
Thankfully, she was not an impulsive person, like an 'act before you think' type teenager. A person who had already tasted the harshness of reality outside the protection of their home and school. Even if they didn't want to, they would have no choice but to be mature and be prudent with their thoughts and actions.
She had already accepted reality.
After exhaling, Zhang Mei Xing gently closed her eyes, letting the world vanished into her view, replaced by the darkness.
The action came to her like an instinctive reaction, as if her body was hypnotized to behave like that.
A moment passed. Time had completely stopped. Sounds followed shortly. Right now, she was sure her heart was no longer beating since she could not hear or feel it even after placing a hand above her chest. She felt empty. To be honest, she also felt scared. Very scared.
There was no telling what would be of her starting now. How could she not feel fear?
Death was like parentage where people would barely be given time for real preparation before confronting it.
The concept of heaven and hell was not even that clear. Perhaps it was just made up by some good, smart people who wanted to give false hope to others. Or perhaps the concept was made up to make others obey rules and morals in fear of getting thrown to a terrible afterlife.
So without real knowledge of the afterlife, who could tell for sure what she would see once she opened her eyes?