THE REASON HE CHOSE ME
865 Words
The room they prepared for me was too big.
Too quiet.
Too unfamiliar.
I stood in the middle of it for a long time, unsure what I was supposed to do… or who I was supposed to be now.
A fiancée?
The word didn’t sit right.
Not when everything about it felt unreal.
Not when just hours ago, I had been invisible.
A knock came at the door.
Soft.
Measured.
Before I could respond, it opened.
“Miss Xiao Jiao,” the maid said politely, stepping inside. “The young master is waiting for you.”
Of course he was.
Nothing about today had given me the illusion of choice.
“I’ll be there shortly,” I replied.
She hesitated, then added carefully, “He doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”
I almost smiled.
Neither does my stepmother.
But I said nothing.
The hallway felt longer than before.
Or maybe it was just me walking toward something I didn’t understand.
When I reached the study, the door was already slightly open.
I knocked anyway.
“Come in.”
His voice.
Calm as ever.
I pushed the door open and stepped inside.
Li Zhen stood by the window, his back to me, the fading evening light casting long shadows across the room. He didn’t turn immediately.
For a moment, neither of us spoke.
Then
“You should be asking questions,” he said.
I closed the door behind me.
“Would you answer them?”
He turned at that.
Slowly.
His expression didn’t change, but his eyes
They sharpened.
“That depends on the question.”
I took a few steps forward.
“Why me?”
There it was.
Simple.
Direct.
The one thing that had been sitting heavily in my chest since morning.
His gaze held mine.
Unblinking.
“As I said before,” he replied, “I don’t make decisions without reason.”
“That’s not an answer.”
A pause.
Then
“No,” he agreed. “It’s not.”
Silence stretched between us again, but this time it felt different.
Tighter.
More deliberate.
Like something was about to break through.
“You don’t remember me,” he said finally.
It wasn’t a question.
My brows drew together slightly. “Should I?”
A flicker.
Something almost like amusement crossed his face but it disappeared too quickly to be certain.
“Eight years ago,” he said, “there was an incident.”
My mind stilled.
Eight years ago…
“I was injured,” he continued. “Badly enough that I shouldn’t have been left alone.”
His voice remained even.
Controlled.
But there was something underneath it now.
Something quieter.
“And yet, I was.”
I didn’t interrupt.
Didn’t move.
Didn’t breathe too loudly.
“Everyone else kept their distance,” he said. “Except one person.”
My heart skipped.
Not loudly.
Just enough.
“She didn’t know who I was,” he added. “Didn’t care.”
His eyes locked onto mine.
And this time
There was no mistaking it.
“That person was you.”
The words landed softly.
But they hit harder than anything else he had said since the beginning.
I stared at him.
Trying to search my memory.
Trying to find something anything that matched what he was saying.
But all I found was fragments.
Blurry.
Incomplete.
“I don’t remember,” I admitted quietly.
“I know.”
No disappointment.
No anger.
Just certainty.
“That’s why I didn’t mention it earlier.”
A strange feeling settled in my chest.
Not guilt.
Not exactly.
But something close.
“If you knew it was me,” I said slowly, “why didn’t you come back sooner?”
This time
He didn’t answer immediately.
His gaze shifted slightly, as if looking past me… or into something much further away.
“I did,” he said.
My breath caught.
“What?”
“I came back,” he repeated. “But you were gone.”
Gone?
“I searched for you,” he continued. “For years.”
Something in his tone changed again.
Not softer.
Not weaker.
Just… more real.
“But it turns out,” he added, his eyes returning to mine, “you weren’t gone.”
A pause.
Then
“You were just hidden.”
The air in the room felt heavier.
Harder to breathe.
Because suddenly
Everything made sense.
The way he had looked at me.
The certainty.
The insistence.
It was never random.
It was never sudden.
It was
Intentional.
“You chose me,” I said slowly, “because of something that happened eight years ago?”
“No.”
The answer came immediately.
Firm.
Certain.
I blinked.
“Then why?”
He stepped closer.
Closing the distance between us again.
Not rushed.
Not hesitant.
Just deliberate.
“I chose you,” he said quietly,
“because you’re still the same person who didn’t walk away.”
My chest tightened.
“You don’t know that,” I whispered.
His gaze didn’t waver.
“I do.”
Silence.
Then
“Prove me wrong.”
I didn’t respond.
Because for the first time in a long time…
I didn’t know how to.
- Writer
