Silent Separation (何以笙箫默) – Gu Man (Epilogue 1.2)

September 19, 2014 by peanuts 17 Comments

Nothing that you don’t know happened in this chapter, but you get to view things from a different perspective. This epilogue will conclude next week. To compensate you for this short and lackluster post, I am enclosing a nice MV of the filming process and fan-made MV of the novel.

Zhao Mo Sheng, why do you always follow me around?

Yi Chen, are you stupid or am I stupid? I chased for such a long time, yet you still don’t know what I am doing!

I don’t intend to find a girlfriend in university.

Then I will stand in line right now and wait for you to graduate from university. I will be given priority, right?

Yi Chen, I did not start the rumour that I am your girlfriend. You have to believe me.

I know.

How do you know?

Because I was the person who started it. I’ve thought about it. If three years later, you are destined to be my girlfriend, I might as well exercise my rights earlier.

Four minutes and twenty-five seconds, too slow. Zhao Mo Sheng, you run so slowly, how did you manage to catch me?

Yi Chen, what about during the test, you run in front of me and I chase you from behind? Like that, I’m sure I’ll run very fast!

Zhao Mo Sheng, don’t you feel ashamed!

Zhao Mo Sheng, you wrote wrongly.

How could that be?  “He Yi Chen”, where is the mistake?

The mistake is in the order of the strokes. It should be like this. Write it again.

Okay.

He Yi Chen, why am I writing your name!?

Epilogue 1.2: Yi Mei’s Chapter – A Person’s Flower Bloomed (translated by peanuts & edited by lidge)

Actually, I’ve always felt  Yi Chen didn’t really like Zhao Mo Sheng that much, even though he admitted that she was his girlfriend.

I remembered I once pretended to be curious and asked Zhao Mo Sheng, how did you know each other and start dating?

She shook her head, dug her brain and stuck her tongue out, appearing very playful: “Pester.” Then, she tugged at Yi Chen’s sleeve and asked, “Is that right?”

Yi Chen snorted and ignored her.

There seemed like not much difference in the way Yi Chen treated her compared to others. He always appeared cold and indifferent, not talking much and his action also did not seem intimate. Normally when they were walking, if Zhao Mo Sheng did not pull him, he’ll walk in front by himself. One time, Zhao Mo Sheng complained to me: “Yi Mei, do you think Yi Chen really like me? A few days ago, I restrained myself from contacting him, but he did not think of contacting me ……”

The ink black eyes which looked at me were full of grievances.

I said: “You try by pretending to lose your temper and see if he will come to coax you.” Yi Chen always disliked people who cause trouble without reason. I also felt I had bad intentions in suggesting this idea.

“He definitely will not.” She never even thought about it but shook her head right away and said dejectedly, “Anyway, I don’t dare.”

The longer I got to know them, the more I felt Yi Chen accepted Zhao Mo Sheng probably merely because of momentary loneliness.

She must be simply a short interlude in Yi Chen’s life and will soon disappear. Because they were so unsuitable, one cool-headed and reserved, but the other passionate and impulsive. One too matured whereas the other too naive. I only needed to be patient, to wait for Yi Chen to realise they were so unsuitable for each other.

However, that scene in the quiet garden shattered all my confidence.

As it turned out, at a place where I couldn’t see, they were like this.

Such intimacy ……

Such ……

That scene in the quiet garden kept appearing in my mind. I turned over on the bed and buried my head in the pillow. After several days, whenever I thought of that scene, I still felt bouts of pain in my heart.

The lights in the dormitory had been turned off, but a few talkative roommates were still awake and talking about the guys in the faculty. I’ve never been interested in their discussions. This time, I could not help but took the initiative to ask: “If the guy does not really like that girl, will he kiss her?”

Immediately, there was an answer.

“As long as you don’t dislike, a kiss is nothing, even can go to bed. He Yi Mei, did someone kiss you?” One of my roommates asked excitedly.

I stared at the ceiling and did not respond.

Even you don’t like, you can still kiss. Therefore, was it possible that Yi Chen actually did not really like her that much?

The roommate was still talking non-stop: “He Yi Mei, tell me, did someone kiss you? Don’t worry, if it is you, he definitely likes you. You’ve such good qualifications, look so pretty and also smart ……”

I listened to her talking incessantly in a daze.

Good qualifications, what was the use? He did not like me.

However, if Zhao Mo Sheng’s qualifications were a lot better than mine, perhaps I would not be so dissatisfied, but as it turned out she was not as good as me in many aspects.

Why should it be her?

That night, I fell asleep with my confused thoughts.

In the future, I still went to C University, still ate with them, but I no longer felt that kind of confidence as before.

Gradually, I realized that even if Yi Chen did not like me, I also did not want to be his little sister.

Thus about a month later, I asked  Zhao Mo Sheng to meet up.

---

I sat in KFC to mentally prepare myself.

Zhao Mo Sheng carried a small backpack, walking pass outside the window. She saw me and waved at me, separated by the window and briskly pushed the door to enter the fast-food outlet.

She seemed to be in a very good mood. I’ve already noticed earlier that when her mood was good, she walked with a slight bounce.

After the business faculty moved to this campus, my first time to C University, she was the one who came to meet up with me. At that time, I was standing in front of the university waiting for Yi Chen. But from a distant, I saw her walking briskly with a slight bounce on University C’s boulevard, the sunshine illuminating through the lush leaves onto her body, the whole person seemed to have blended with the sunshine.

“Hello, Yi Mei! Yi Chen has to attend a meeting so he sent me to pick you up.” At that time, she walked up to me and smilingly said to me. Now, she was also using the same brisk pace to walk up to me: “Yi Mei, you’re here so early.”

She sat down opposite me: “What are we eating? I have coupons.” She took out a stack of coupons from the bag and spread them out on the table to study them.

“Whatever.”

“I’ll help you to order the children’s set meal, then give the toy to Yi Chen to play.” She said with a serious face.

I knew she was joking, but I couldn’t even laugh a little. I almost hated her relaxed attitude, which was in stark contrast to my current nervousness.

She went to queue up, whereas I was left to guard our seats.

The queue was a little long, and she was nearly at the end of the queue.  She stretched out her head and jumped up to look at the sign in front. Hence, she did not pay attention to the person beside her and accidentally knocked over a guy’s Coke. Then, a burst of chaos.

I was thinking if Yi Chen was here, he’ll certainly frown, then step forward to help her clean up the mess.

Such a girl, what could she help Yi Chen? She and Yi Chen were simply from two different worlds. She was all glitter but knew nothing at all and basically could not enter Yi Chen’s inner world. Yi Chen needed someone who can assist him and take care of him, not a girlfriend like this who always needed him to look out and take care of her.

She carried the meal tray back to the seats. The hem of her right sleeve was soaked in Coke, but she didn’t mind, looked guiltily at me and said: “Yi Mei, please don’t tell Yi Chen that I’ve done something bad again.”

I nodded and absentmindedly ate a few French fries.

“Mo Sheng.” I called her.

She was sipping Coke. When she heard me, she raised her head and looked at me with her jet-black eyes.

I avoided her gaze and quickly said: “Yi Chen and I are not brother and sister. Before, both of our families were very good neighbors. We all have the surname He so the adults just chose similar names. Later, Yi Chen’s father and mother had an accident so our family adopted Yi Chen.”

I finished saying in one breath. She was still sipping Coke and foolishly stared at me with no reaction.

Suddenly, I felt irritated and said with emphasis: “Don’t you understand? We are not really brother and sister as we are not related by blood at all.”

“Yi Mei, are you joking? ” She finally responded, but this kind of reply made me angry.

“Yi Chen has never said ……” She was obviously at a loss.

“It’s our family’s issue so why would Yi Chen need to tell you? Did Yi Chen tell you anything important before?” Seeing her sudden pale face, I knew I’ve spoken about her weak point. Sometimes, when I observed their interaction with each other, they didn’t seem like a couple but a bit like an adult taking care of a child. Thus, will an adult say anything important to a child?

Later, in the business world, someone assessed me as such: “He Yi Mei, you are the typical case of one can’t judge a book by its cover. You appear gentle and soft, as if very easy to bully. In fact, you are the trickiest, good at hitting a person’s weakest point and backing them into a corner.”

I smile while listening, occasionally recalling the first time I displayed this skill. It was on an afternoon like this on my good friend, a girl who actually had no confident in her own love affair.

Actually at that time, who had confidence in their love affair? Yi Chen and Zhao Mo Sheng’s classmates and friends, including me, also felt they were rather unsuitable and will break up sooner or later.

At that time, Yi Chen was probably the only one who felt they will always be together.

He made a mistake in being too confident.

I looked at an obviously confused Zhao Mo Sheng and dropped a second bomb. “Today, I want to tell you, I love Yi Chen. I do not want to secretly love him. I want to compete openly with you.”

Taking advantage of the aftershocks, in the end I said softly: “Zhao Mo Sheng, you think you can compete and win over the two decades of deep affection between Yi Chen and me?”

After saying this, I got up and left. For a split second when I pushed open the door, to my surprise, all I could think of was that the food she had bought was not eaten and whether she still had the mood to eat.

---

For the next few days, I stayed in my own university and did not go to C University.

Thinking carefully about it, I was actually very weak, perhaps even despicable. I dared not stand in front of Yi Chen to confess my feeling directly so I went to look for  Zhao Mo Sheng for a showdown, wanting to use her to tell Yi Chen.

Did you know that I’ve never treated you as a brother?

How would Yi Chen answer her?

I constantly imagined Yi Chen’s answer, feeling trapped in a kind of despair but on the same token, full of hope. After a week, there were still no news of them, my mind became flustered.

I picked up the phone over and over again but did not know who to call. Zhao Mo Sheng? Could what happened to us last time be considered a falling out? What about Yi Chen?

The long period of time made me felt I ‘ve already been abandoned and forgotten by them. Two days later, I finally could not bear it and went to C University to find out that merely a few days had gone, but the matter was already turned upside down.

Zhao Mo Sheng was gone.

It was said that she went to the United States.

---

In the next few years, I could slowly feel the impact of Zhao Mo Sheng leaving Yi Chen. At that time, I was even under the impression that the impact was weak because Yi Chen’s behavior can be considered calm.