Chapter 61
Chapter 61
You never know which will come first: tomorrow or an accident.
A person who was perfectly fine in the morning had become a mangled corpse by the afternoon.
From the moment Fang Man was declared dead and the white sheet was pulled over her, I was in a complete daze.
I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t even shed a single tear.
I had no idea what was happening around me; I just stared blankly at that white sheet.
There was no longer any need to take Fang Man’s body to the hospital. She was to be taken directly to the funeral home.
Meng Yifan seemed to realize that this wasn’t an ordinary car accident. He sent Xie Peng and Li Xingyang to the funeral home first, then took me along with the traffic police back to their station.
I didn’t know why I was going to the traffic police station. Meng Yifan told me to go, so I went.
At the station, the police were questioning the driver who caused the accident while Meng Yifan stood to the side, swearing at him furiously.
The driver kept his head down and remained silent, refusing to answer any of the officers’ questions.
There was clearly something wrong with this driver.
But I didn’t care whether there was something wrong with him or not. I had only one thought: a life for a life.
A female officer stood by, trying to calm Meng Yifan and me down. She prepared to lead us to another room to prevent a physical confrontation with the driver.
The moment I stood up, I snatched a pen off the desk and lunged at the driver, trying to stab him.
“Chen Mo!”
Meng Yifan was startled and failed to grab me in time.
However, the police weren’t just for show. Two male officers quickly tackled me to the ground.
“Family members, stay calm!”
“The deceased is already gone. Don’t do anything foolish!”
“If you stab him, you’ll go to prison too! Once we’ve finished our investigation, we will give you a satisfactory resolution!”
The two officers didn’t make things difficult for me. After their warning, they let me go and told Meng Yifan to keep a close eye on me.
Slumped on the floor, I finally broke down and wailed.
I sobbed to Meng Yifan, telling him that Fang Man was dead.
Meng Yifan’s eyes were also red. He didn’t know how to comfort me.
Fang Man had been at the shop for a year. We had spent every day together for a year, and now, a living, breathing person had been crushed beyond recognition right before our eyes.
“Chen Mo, it’s already happened. I just called Brother Tian. He’s on his way…”
Before Meng Yifan could finish his sentence, a figure rushed in. It was Song Xiaotian.
His eyes were bloodshot as he stared at us blankly. “What happened… she was fine… how can she be gone?”
“He hit her.”
Meng Yifan pointed at the driver, his voice choking with emotion. “This animal hit her.”
“How the hell were you driving!”
Song Xiaotian exploded on the spot. Even two officers couldn’t hold him back.
The driver was punched instantly and then kicked off his chair by Song Xiaotian.
“I’m asking you, how the fuck were you driving!”
“Is your whole family dead? Were you rushing to their goddamn funeral!”
The room was filled with nothing but Song Xiaotian’s roars and the driver’s screams of pain.
Several more officers rushed in, but they struggled to pull Song Xiaotian away.
“Isn’t this Song Xiaotian!”
“Song Xiaotian, you used to be a cop!”
“Do you want to go to jail!”
“Let him go, now! Don’t make this worse!”
Even more staff members rushed in. Only then did they manage to pull Song Xiaotian away, with several men literally carrying him into another room.
Meng Yifan and I followed.
The officer who recognized Song Xiaotian seemed to be a captain.
He was clearly annoyed, but he didn’t take it out on us. “I can understand how you feel, but being impulsive won’t solve anything. Once we investigate how the accident happened, he’ll pay the compensation he owes and serve the time he deserves. If you lay another hand on him and cause a serious injury, you’ll be going to prison too.”
“The man from earlier has been sent to the hospital. We found that his physical condition is a bit off. He might have been suffering from some underlying illness.”
Song Xiaotian’s eyes were bloodshot as he slammed a hand onto the table. “My sister was only twenty-three this year! Her life was just beginning! He hit her on purpose-the bastard did it on purpose! If that grandson of a bitch didn’t have some terminal illness and take someone’s money to ram my sister to death, I’ll chop my own head off!”
The captain sighed and waved a hand dismissively. “What the truth is, that’s our business. We are responsible for investigating the facts of the accident. If it’s truly as you say, the criminal investigation department will step in and clear things up.”
“I’ll give you a word of advice: don’t do anything impulsive. If that man turns out to have some medical issue at the hospital and tries to extort you, I’m telling you, you’ll really be losing more than you gain.”
Finally, the captain escorted us out of the Criminal Police Force, seemingly terrified that we might try to come back inside.
He even arranged for someone to take us to the funeral parlor in a police car.
She was gone; it was time to handle the final arrangements.
Over the next two days, we were occupied with Fang Man’s funeral.
Fang Man’s parents were honest, salt-of-the-earth workers who had been laid off years ago. The couple was quite old, both in their early sixties.
I had heard Fang Man mention before that she wasn’t her parents’ first child. She’d had an older brother, but when he was eight or nine, he had gone swimming in a river and drowned.
The couple had eventually conceived again, and that child was Fang Man. At the time, they were both nearly forty; it hadn’t been easy for them to have another child.
They had protected and doted on Fang Man in every possible way.
But misfortune always seems to pick on the miserable. The Heavenly God is truly cruel, taking away the couple’s second child as well.
At the funeral, Fang Man’s parents fainted from crying several times. It was heartbreaking to watch.
Not many people attended. Aside from some of Fang Man’s relatives, it was just our colleagues from the shop.
Some of the colleagues couldn’t help but shed tears, lamenting that such a good girl had lost her life so young.
But as her boyfriend, I hardly shed a tear the entire time.
I don’t know why, but I just couldn’t cry. I would dream of Fang Man, and when I woke up and remembered she was dead, the sense of loss was so overwhelming that I even had to burn myself with cigarette butts just to find some relief.
Yet, I still couldn’t cry.
It wasn’t… it wasn’t until Fang Man was cremated that I finally broke. I wailed, my heart tearing into pieces.
I thought about the girl I loved most. A vibrant, living person had now become a pile of ash. The crushing weight of that reality left me breathless.
When the funeral finally ended and we walked out of the cemetery, Fang Man’s parents looked at me as if I were their own child.
“Manman told us a long time ago that she was seeing someone, a young man named Chen. She said he was a very good man. It seems our girl’s judgment was right.”
Fang Man’s father gripped my hand tightly. “Xiao Chen, you’ve been busy running around these past two days to see my daughter off on her final journey. I thank you. If you have the time, please come by the house and sit with us…”
As he spoke, the elderly couple began to cry again.
Seeing their tears, I quickly pulled them into a hug. “Uncle, Auntie, please take care of yourselves. I’ll come to see you often from now on. I’ll look after you in your old age. I mean what I say.”
I didn’t dare tell them that Fang Man’s death… wasn’t an accident.
I didn’t dare tell them that Fang Man had died because of me.
I didn’t even dare tell them that the person truly responsible for Fang Man’s death might never face justice.