Chapter 1
Stomach cancer
The rhythmic ticking of the wall clock echoed through the hospital corridor. It felt like the beat inside Li Kexin's chest—pounding wildly, uncontrollably.
Her hands trembled as she held the piece of paper. Her lips were pressed so tightly together that they hurt. Her eyes were swollen and red, tears spilling over without restraint.
"Why… why is this happening?" she whispered bitterly. Her gaze swept once more across the words printed on the paper—the one the doctor had handed her moments ago.
"Mrs. Li, I'm very sorry. You've been diagnosed with stage-two stomach cancer. You need immediate surgery and radiation therapy. Please ask your husband to sign the consent form as soon as possible. Don't delay."
She couldn't stop the sob that tore from her throat. She had never imagined she was ill—not until recently, when constant fatigue and persistent stomach pain finally drove her to see a doctor. At first, she had blamed the pain on stress—grief from losing both her parents in a car accident. But now, it was confirmed: stomach cancer, stage two.
Covering her face with one trembling hand, she broke down completely, crying without caring who might see.
"Why must something so cruel happen to me?" she wept, tears sliding slowly down her cheeks.
Her heart felt as though it were being crushed. The man she thought of—her husband—was not only the first and only man she had ever loved; he was also her shelter in every storm. He was her strength, her hope… the embodiment of true love for a woman like her—one who battled depression and had just lost her parents barely ten days ago.
"Is the patient all right?" a young nurse asked gently as she passed by.
Li Kexin shook her head and drew in a deep, trembling breath. "I'm fine," she said, forcing a smile even as tears still streaked her face. She slipped the medical report carefully into her handbag.
"If there's anything I can do to help, please don't hesitate to tell me," the nurse said kindly.
Li Kexin wiped away her tears and gave a faint, apologetic smile.
"It's all right. I'll be leaving now. I'm sorry for the trouble."
Straightening her elegant white designer coat, she stood and walked away, her expression heavy with sorrow.
No matter how hard she tried to hold herself together, every thought, every image that surfaced in her mind was of him—her young, handsome husband, Wang Zehao, whose warm smile had always been her light. He loved her dearly, as though she were the most fragile glass in his heart.
"My love… if you ever find out about this, how heartbroken will you be?" she murmured to herself.
Her eyes wandered around the hall until they caught sight of a public telephone sign beyond the crowd and a row of wheelchairs. Quickly, she walked toward it, rummaging in her handbag for a few coins.
Her phone battery had died earlier, so the public phone was her only connection to him now—in this cold, sterile hospital filled with sorrow.
Li Kexin found a fifty-cent coin, slipped it into the slot, and lifted the receiver.
The harsh white fluorescent light above her head cast a pale glow over the red metal casing and the keypad with its ten worn numbers.
At that moment, she realized—this phone line was the only thing that could reach him.
And when he answered, she knew there might be no comforting words—only tears, only pain that felt as though he were suffering right alongside her.
But she had no choice—she had to tell her husband the bitter truth.
Yet when Li Kexin stood before the vast hospital lobby, her fingers tightened around the coin in her hand. After a long, trembling breath, she slowly slipped it back into her handbag.
She wasn't ready.
Not ready to speak of this cruel fate. Because she was afraid—afraid that once he knew, her husband would be devastated.
That man… the one who had once held her so tightly on the day her world collapsed.
If he knew of her illness, his heart would surely shatter.
She couldn't bear it—she couldn't bear to hear his cries.
All she wanted now was to protect his heart for as long as she could.
At least until she recovered.
Or, if fate refused to show mercy, until her final day by his side.
She wanted to keep his smile with her until the moment of farewell—if destiny had already chosen her death through this cruel disease.
And so she whispered to herself,
"No… I'm not ready to tell Zehao yet."
That afternoon, after wandering aimlessly around the city for hours, Li Kexin finally decided to take a taxi back to New Taipei—the small town where she had lived before her marriage. There, in an old apartment, she and her husband had spent their first years together after graduating from university—years filled with simplicity and warmth.
The small room on the fourth floor had witnessed their laughter, their quarrels, and their dreams. It was the cradle of all their tenderness—a nest her parents once called the "heart of their new family" in Taipei.
During the long taxi ride, Li Kexin took out her mobile phone and tried once more to turn it on. But her old Nokia 1011 remained lifeless. The faint silver keypad had long since faded, leaving behind only a heavy square block resting in her palm—a phone that was now useless, except perhaps as a weapon against a thief, given its weight of half a kilogram.
She sighed quietly, ignoring the driver, her mind adrift in sorrow. For the eighth time that day, she gave up on calling her husband. She would wait until she got home, she decided. Then she would call him.
The car moved along the expressway, winding through the cliffs and curves. When they finally reached her destination, she asked the driver to stop in front of a building that stood halfway between old and new—faded walls, but a sense of familiarity that made her heart ache.
She paid the fare, handed over a small tip, and stepped out of the car. The air here was gentler than in the city center. The faint scent of grass and wildflowers drifted in the wind. The rustle of fallen leaves carried memories from years long past.
"This place… it hasn't changed at all," she murmured softly, drawing a deep breath as if to inhale her youth once more.
She took the elevator up to the fourth floor. But when she reached her door and slid the key into the lock, a strange feeling stopped her. The door wasn't locked.
"Eh? That can't be right…" she whispered, frowning.
The latch hung loosely, as though the door had been left open by mistake.
A chill ran down her spine. Her first thought was that there had been a break-in. But she forced herself to move slowly, cautiously, pushing the heavy wooden door open just a crack.
And then she froze.