Chapter 17: His Love Story
Crystal did not change at all but kept asking him difficult questions. When Jonathan was in a good mood, their dialogue went something like this:
"Shall we have a child?" Crystal would say, only to get the reply,
"No!" he replied.
Sometimes she would ask him, "When will you marry me?"
Jonathan would answer by saying, "Let's talk about the child. I think it's a good idea."
Then she would ask him another question, "Do you know when my birthday is?"
"When? " He would ask casually, looking at the newspaper.
Crystal would tell him, "Today next month."
Jonathan would simply reply and say, "Oh!" They could go on like this for ages, making meaningless conversations.
While he was in a bad mood, things were somewhat different. In the evening he would come home tipsy from time to time. Crystal, being excited to see him, would say, "You're back finally. I've been waiting for you for a long time! Whenever she heard the door open, she ran out cheerfully, in a pink floral apron which smelled of home cooking.
"Well!" Jonathan would say as he threw his bloody clothes on the floor and sat down on the sofa, sitting on the floor exhaustedly. He would also grab a soft cushion to put behind his wounded back.
Crystal would glance at him and ask him more questions, like, "When will you take me to the jewelry store?"
Jonathan would frown at her and say, "I'm busy."
"Are you determined to marry me?" she would ask him.
He would get a bit annoyed and reply, "Didn't I tell you I am busy?"
One day she asked him, "Do you know today is my birthday? You promised me... last time... "
Jonathan threw his bank card at her and said, "Go shopping with your sister, don't bother me."
That reduced her to tears and she sat on the ground, crying for a while. Seeing that he was still ignoring her, she sat beside him, took his hand and shook it, she said, "Don't be angry, I don't need the ring, just buy me a birthday cake. "
"That's enough! Could you be quiet for a while?" Jonathan had shouted.
He eventually chased her out of the room. She left him alone in the room. Jonathan buried his face in his hands, the tears running down his fingers. Crystal didn't know that he had gone to the jewelry store and picked out a beautiful ring for her.
When he had just paid and was about to put the ring away, he received an urgent call from his stepfather who said, "Your mother is dying, she wants to see you. "
"What did you say?" Jonathan asked, and the ring fell on the ground, and the diamond hit the ground. The sound was as clear as a piano melody. He said, "Don't you tell me that it's acute appendicitis. She could recover after several days."
"It's advanced liver cancer, and the doctor says that it's only half a year for her, but it got worse in a week," his stepfather told him.
Shaken by the news, Jonathan told him, 'I'll get there right away!"
"Hurry up," there isn't much time," his stepfather said.
Jonathan rushed to the hospital. But when he was at a crossroads, a van ran into him. He got out of his battered car and wanted to take a taxi to get there. It was winter, the coldest winter of his life. The chilly wind caught the wound on his back, and the pain was just unbearable for him.
He ran forward tirelessly, not because someone was chasing him down with a knife, but because he was eager to meet his favorite person, who was waiting for him in the hospital, for the last time. He was being chased and eventually got away on a motorcycle.
By the time he finally got there, his mother had died.
His stepfather asked him, "Why did you only come here now?"
Jonathan yelled at him, "Do you know that I have been hunted down by others? "
She waited for three hours until the last moment. She was waiting for you!"
"Mom! I am sorry!" he cried. He knelt in front of the bed, lying close to her body which had turned cold.
"Mama! I'm sorry! I didn't take good care of you. I didn't listen to you. I wish I had lived up to your expectations of being a policeman, " Jonathan cried.
His stepfather patted him on the shoulder and said in tears, "I told her everything. She's waited for you, looking at the door. She said that she was the guilty one."
"Mom!" Jonathan said and lifted the white sheet to hold her hands one more time. "Now that you are gone, life is meaningless."
Crystal never came back after Jonathan drove her away. He continued his life as usual. He had no choice but to do what he disliked and live and idle life. Occasionally he thought of Crystal and would never forget her birthday ever again as it was the anniversary of his mother's death.