Me After Meeting You

When Amber arrived at Elly’s hometown, it was almost noon. The town’s scenery remained the same, only the number of travellers on the road had increased.© 2024 Nôv/el/Dram/a.Org.

When she arrived at the hospital, she saw a few familiar faces. There was the auntie who had led her through the town, the restaurant owner’s wife, and some of the town citizens who she had met and asked for directions from.

Without any exception, their eyes were all red, anger spilling into their faces. Luckily, the police were at the hospital to maintain order, along with some strangers who were simply taking pictures and videos without stopping.

Once Amber arrived, a number of supercilious looks were immediately aimed at her. The auntie who had led her through the town even spat a glob of saliva at her from a far as she angrily scolded, “An entire cabal of villains! Only helping each other spread evil, what a waste of your beauty!”

Amber shifted her gaze, expressionless. The police officer who had called her ignored the heckling words and quietly explained the situation to Amber.

“… He prepared some blowfish meat, said that he was treating the other parents to a meal as an apology, bowed down to everyone to invite them over, and in the end, all of them ended up being poisoned. Some of the older folks weren’t able to handle it and passed away last night, and there are still a few people in the intensive care unit.”

Amber was shocked after hearing that piece of news, and only after recovering a while later did she ask, “Brown … How’s Mark Brown?”

“He was also poisoned, though he recovered right before dawn today. The first thing he wanted to do when he woke up was see you.”

“You said earlier that the poisoning incident was deliberate?”

“Yes. According to our preliminary investigation, this was a premeditated poisoning. In his backyard, we dug out a large number of dried blowfish organs. Chemical tests revealed that the blowfish meat that they consumed last night had a high degree of toxins within it, much more than would ordinarily be present. But the suspect refuses to confess to his crime or answer any of our questions, and says that he’ll only reveal the truth after seeing you.”

Amber didn’t know what to say. She didn’t expect that Elly’s father would want to see her, and definitely didn’t expect him to use it as a bargaining chip.

The police brought her to the door of Elly’s father ward. When Amber pushed the door open and entered, she saw Mark Brown alone in the two patient room. At present, he was half sitting up on the bed, his face was deathly pale, and his right hand was clutching at the side of the bed. On his wrist was a bright handcuff.

When he saw Amber enter, he turned his head to her and smiled.

Amber felt very uncomfortable as she walked to the side of his bed. “The police said that you wanted to see me. Is that right?”

“Yes.” Despite having just been at death’s door, the man in front of her seemed the same as before, save his wan and sallow expression. As always, he was dressed very neatly with his hair combed and tidily swept behind his head. He looked at her with a very sincere expression. “I know that you’re a good doctor. I’m very happy that you care this much for Elly, and that she was able to meet you even after suffering through so much sadness and tragedy in her life.”

Amber looked at him quietly, not saying anything.

Elly’s father didn’t want her to say anything either. He turned around again to gaze outside the window, slowly reminiscing about the past as a calm expression surfacedon his face. “I let her down by ignoring her all these years. But she’s very determined, even getting the top score of the town up on graduating from elementary school.

At that time, I thought, ‘I can’t keep living life like this.’ It wasn’t for myself, but for her, for my mother. I knew that I should also settle down, so I started fishing in the open ocean with some companions. But life just seemed to bear a grudge against me. As soon as I finished my preparations, that happened to Elly.”

“Elly was originally introverted but obedient, never bringing either of us any trouble. Even if there was trouble, all she would do was hide at home, not saying anything, unwilling to go to school or even to leave the house. If I hadn’t seen that video, even I wouldn’t have known what had happened. Does that make me a failure of a father in your eyes?”

He paused for a moment to murmur, “To give birth to a child without raising her is not kindness but sin … I’ve let her down miserably. Even after this happened to her, I couldn’t reclaim justice for her. And I even listened to the others, and thought that it would be better for her to quash everything down. To that end, I even forced her to go to school by beating her. If those people were the culprits, then I, I’m the executioner who drove her crazy.”

Amber didn’t want to hear these remorseful words which had come far too late. If he hadn’t taken the opportunity to help her when it was there, then any feeling of remorse on his part was by definition in sincere-the most important condition to repentance was how one recovered and made a mends for the mistakes they committed. “She’s only fourteen. If you truly want to save her, there’s still time.”

Mark shook his head. “There’s no time left.” He laughed bitterly as he lamented, “I don’t know how to face her. Maybe, in this life time, I won’t ever know how to face her.”

He turned back around to face Amber. “Elly … will she be able to recover?”