Chapter 3

All the hardship of my life became worth it in that moment.

The final image froze at his wedding.

He wore a crisp suit, and Elise stood beside him with a smile as bright as flowers.

He walked up to me with a glass of wine, his eyes red:

“Mom, thank you.”

“Without you, I wouldn’t be who I am today.”

“From now on, Elise and I will take care of you together.”

I looked at him, this boy who once needed me to hold him and coax him, this boy who once needed me to hold his hand while he walked, and he had truly grown up.

He had his own family and someone he wanted to protect for the rest of his life.

I solemnly placed him in another woman’s hands, and my mission seemed truly complete.

I smiled and drank that glass of wine, sweet and spicy, burning all the way into my heart.

“Mom...”

A faint murmur yanked me out of the warm memory.

I floated in the cold air, watching the police tape off the scene, watching my body be covered with a white sheet.

Like an invisible shadow, I floated back home.

The lights at home were still on, and the door was half-closed, so I drifted lightly inside.

The living room was a mess.

The basin Albert and I had knocked over during the argument earlier was still tilted on the floor, and the water stains marked the floor like an ugly scar.

Albert was pacing anxiously back and forth in the living room, already changed into clothes for going out, his face full of panic.

Elise grabbed his arm, and her voice carried a completely different urgency from before I left:

“Don’t panic yet! Maybe Mom just went downstairs to sit in the garden. Hasn’t she done that before?”

“It’s so cold outside, she can’t have gone far!”

“Before was before! Is it the same now?” Albert suddenly shook off her hand, his eyes bloodshot.

“I just said that awful thing! She took it to heart! She must have taken it to heart!”

The regret and fear in his voice pierced my soul like needles.

“Then... then I’ll call Mrs. Ford downstairs and ask around first. Don’t rush out alone. We’ll split up and look, and we’ll be faster.”

Elise was also frightened by his state and started frantically scrolling through her contacts.

But Albert seemed not to hear her at all, grabbed the keys, and rushed out the door, his hoarse cry echoing from the stairwell:

“Mom! Mom! Where are you?”

I followed him, or rather, I was pulled by the huge grief and fear on him, rushing into the cold night with him.

He searched like he had gone mad.

The bench in the community garden where I used to love sitting in a daze was empty.

At the security booth at the community entrance, the guard shook his head and said he had not seen me leave during that time.

Albert was so anxious that sweat covered his forehead, and he kept describing what I was wearing to people, his words tumbling over each other.

The farmers’ market I often went to had already closed for the day, leaving only messy vegetable leaves swirling in the cold wind.

He stood in the middle of the empty market, looking around blankly, like a lost child.

He kept muttering mechanically, “Where could she have gone? Where else could she go?”

I floated behind him, looking at his helpless back, my heart aching beyond words.

I wanted to tell him, Albert, stop looking, I’m right here.

But the wind passed through my body and carried away all my silent calls.

One hour, two hours...

Time passed little by little, the night grew deeper, and the cold grew heavier.

Albert’s lips had turned purple from the cold, and his steps had grown unsteady.

But he was still searching, walking along every street and craning his neck to look into every dark alley.

When he dragged his lead-heavy legs back home again, it was already late at night.

Elise had also made every call she could make, to relatives, friends, and my old neighbors...

Not one person had seen me.

She sat on the sofa, holding her head in both hands, also on the edge of collapse.

When she saw Albert return empty-handed, the last trace of luck in her eyes went out.

“Still... nothing?” she asked, trembling.

Albert did not speak, and only walked to the doorway of my room.

Looking at the empty bed inside, he leaned against the doorframe and slid down little by little, like a puddle of mud.

Silence, deathly silence.

Suddenly, Elise stood up.

Her reddened eyes stared hard at Albert, and the emotions she had suppressed all night finally erupted in that moment.

“I just don’t understand! What exactly does she want? How have we wronged her?”

“Just because you said one angry sentence, she runs away from home?”

“Is she eight or eighteen? Doesn’t she know she’s sick?”

“Doesn’t she know she could get lost or get into an accident if she goes out?!”