Chapter One: A Desperate Plea Met with Ridicule
914 Words
On the night of their third wedding anniversary, Su Wan lay in the operating room, teetering on the brink of death from massive internal bleeding.
An ectopic pregnancy had ruptured without warning, flooding her abdominal cavity with blood while the fetal heartbeat flatlined. To save her life, the doctors had no choice but to urgently remove one of her fallopian tubes. A chilling critical condition notice was placed in her trembling hands, its words striking her to the core: she had essentially lost the ability to conceive naturally, making it nearly impossible for her to ever have a child of her own.
A tearing agony radiated from her incision, and the fading anesthesia couldn't numb the icy dread that had seeped into her marrow. Gritting her teeth against the excruciating pain, she dialed Shen Yan's number over and over. Seventeen calls went completely unanswered.
Unable to bear watching, a sympathetic nurse stepped in and dialed the eighteenth call for her.
The moment it connected, the speaker erupted with the blare of nightclub music and roaring laughter. Lin Weiwei deliberately leaned close to the phone, her sickeningly sweet yet piercing voice drilling into Su Wan's ear. "A-Yan, is it that clingy wife of yours again? Tonight is my birthday party, and she just has to keep calling to ruin the mood. Is she just jealous that we're finally happy?"
Shen Yan's reprimand followed instantly, his disgust blatant and unapologetic. Every word dripped with utter impatience: "Su Wan, that's enough. Weiwei has a weak heart and is easily startled; she can't take the slightest shock. You're harassing her over and over, begging for attention—have you no decency? Faking illness, faking a medical emergency for sympathy... your tactics are cheap and pathetic."
A metallic tang of blood surged in her throat, and the searing pain from her wound left her breathless. Summoning the very last ounce of her strength, Su Wan screamed into the phone, her voice laced with the despair of the dying: "I'm not faking! I'm in emergency surgery right now! Our baby is gone, and I almost died on that operating table!"
"Keep making things up." Shen Yan's cold sneer came through the speaker, laying bare his irritation and contempt. "Last time your mother was hospitalized, you threw a fit and wouldn't let it go, just to manipulate my sympathy. Su Wan, can you stop being so pathetically obsessive?"
Seizing the moment, Lin Weiwei let out a soft chuckle and delivered the final blow, her passive-aggressive provocation striking right at the heart: "Miss Su, marriage is all about maintaining some dignity. A-Yan has never loved you. You've occupied the position of Mrs. Shen for three years; you really should be satisfied by now."
"Satisfied?" Years of suppressed grievances shattered completely. Tears cascaded down Su Wan's face as her body trembled uncontrollably. "I donated blood to save your life! I spent years nursing your frail mother! I guarded that empty villa through countless lonely nights! I gave you ten years of my youth and my very soul—what gives you the right to tell me to be satisfied?"
"You're truly out of your mind."
Beep. Beep. Beep.
A cold dial tone abruptly rang out. The call was ruthlessly disconnected, severing the last thread of her will to survive.
At midnight, their third wedding anniversary came to a definitive end.
Shen Yan sent only three icy words: Not coming home.
At that exact second, his pinned social media post updated with a photo of him and Lin Weiwei. She nestled obediently against his chest, her eyes flirtatious and tender. The caption was dripping with ambiguity: Year after year, my A-Yan.
Su Wan stared quietly at the pale surgical light above. The tears in her eyes had finally run dry. The heart that had burned passionately for Shen Yan for a decade fell completely silent in that instant. She was fighting for her life, having lost her child and broken her body, yet her life and death ultimately couldn't weigh against a single whine from the woman he worshiped, or the lively atmosphere of a birthday party.
On the day she was discharged, Shen Yan finally showed up—hours late. Dressed in a bespoke suit that carried the faint, unfamiliar scent of sweet perfume, he looked down at her pale, emaciated form. His tone was sharp and bone-chilling, devoid of a shred of pity: "Are you done throwing your tantrum? Weiwei finally calmed down, and now you're faking illness for sympathy again. Su Wan, can't you give us a single day of peace?"
Su Wan raised her eyes, quietly taking in the man she had loved for ten years and given her all to. There was no arguing, no crying, no futile explanations.
The deepest heartbreak is always completely silent.
Back in the empty villa, she efficiently packed a single suitcase. She didn't take a single cent of the Shen family's money, nor any jewelry or luxury goods. A neatly printed divorce agreement rested squarely in the center of the coffee table, topped with the wedding ring Shen Yan had perfunctorily slipped onto her finger on their wedding day—a ring he had never cherished.
With her own hands, she threw away the meticulously crafted third-anniversary cake and tossed the scarf she had spent three months knitting stitch by stitch. Ten years of burning passion and sincere devotion were reduced to absolute zero in that moment, settling into dust, forever gone.
- Writer
