Piercing cries of agony, both near and far, filled her ears. Sha Man felt a splitting headache and momentarily didn't know where she was. What had happened, and what was wrong with her?
She remembered that she had just finished her thesis defense and was excitedly on her way to find her boyfriend. But she found him passionately kissing someone else; the other woman was a fellow student from their department.
The boyfriend who always professed his love had cheated, and Sha Man was slow to react.
Then came the lengthy, narrative and emotional confession by the other woman. Only then did Sha Man realize that her boyfriend had been ambiguously involved with this woman while dating her. Now that graduation was near, the woman had proposed to her boyfriend, revealing that her father was the head of a local village. The woman guaranteed her boyfriend a position as a village official in her hometown, and with her father's connections, he could rapidly climb the social ladder, becoming a rising star, and then reap fame and fortune.
Her boyfriend agreed, and while their affair was transitioning from secret to public, Sha Man had come upon them.
"You have always inquired about what my father and brother do for a living," Sha Man calmly ignored the triumphant woman and turned to her boyfriend, "I was born out of the family's birth plan, so I took my mother's surname and used my father's surname as my given name. With your interest in my family's city, you should know who he is without me saying."
Her boyfriend quickly masked the excited look in his eyes and briskly let go of the woman's hand, walking towards her.
"Manman, this is a misunderstanding. She has had a crush on me and just now confessed her feelings. I felt sorry for her and showed some compassion. You should know you are the only one in my heart," he said.
The boyfriend approached her, tall and handsome, with a beaming smile just as when she had fallen for him.
But that was in the past. She had been heartbroken and had seen a person's true colors.
"But I don't want you anymore. You've been dumped by me," she said.
Sha Man announced this loudly and turned to leave in style. Her boyfriend—no, by that time her ex-boyfriend—immediately followed her. At that moment, the other woman, like a mad person, charged forward from behind.
"Go to hell! I don't want to be the secret lover any longer," the woman shouted viciously and pushed, not the despicable man, but her.
Next, she heard the sharp screeching of brakes and the surprised shouts of the people around her. The last scene that fell into her vision was the ferocious face of the woman and the incredibly expressive face of the cheating ex-boyfriend.
Sha Man was pushed by that woman, resulting in a traffic accident. Damned cheating man, damned mistress, and the damned campus racers. Sha Man felt a terrible pain in her head. Feeling the pain meant she wasn't dead. So now she must be in a hospital. Her parents must have rushed over, and her brother must have taken leave to come as well.
"It's been three days and three nights, she's long gone. Old Fourth's wife, stop crying over a corpse and go cook instead. There are more than a dozen mouths to feed in our family, young and old alike," a woman's loud voice said, "Old Fourth, hurry up and push the cart. Her grandma says children can't go to the ancestors' graves. It's not dark yet, take the girl and bury her towards Nanshan. The eldest girl in our house is about to get married, and our Erlang is also looking to propose. Don't let your girl block their good fortune."
Sha Man suddenly felt herself being held tightly, with warm droplets falling onto her face.
"Second Aunt, my Manman is still warm, my Manman isn't dead," he exclaimed.
"Old Fourth, control your wife, why is she so stubborn? The person is dead, what's the point of holding her, do you want to eat the food she cooks later?" Bang! It seemed as if the loud voice had slammed the door on her way out.
The crying around her grew louder, from men, women, and children alike. Did the hospital's doctors and nurses think she was dead? Sha Man thought that she had to open her eyes quickly to tell her parents that she was still alive. Otherwise, being treated as a corpse and taken to the morgue would be too terrifying.
Sha Man's fingers twitched slightly, and she slowly opened her eyes. All that entered her sight were unfamiliar faces.
The woman holding her was dressed in a blue coarse cloth jacket with a big lapel, her hair pulled back into a bun and secured by a silver hairpin, with a pair of silver lilac earrings swelling on her ears like peaches.
"Manman, Manman can move, Manman opened her eyes!" she cried out.
The woman held Sha Man even tighter. Sha Man felt suffocated by the embrace and coughed miserably. The woman quickly let go of Sha Man, and only then could Sha Man clearly see her surroundings.