“Mr. Burns, Mrs. Burns, she…” Mrs. Protich choked intermittently, wanting to continue speaking but unable to produce any sound, her mouth quivering, every breath filled with sobs.
“What happened to her?” Hamish asked cautiously, as if touching a mirror cracked into a spider’s web, fearing it might shatter at the slightest pressure.
“Mrs. Burns had an accident. The villa caught fire, and Mrs. Burns was burned alive inside… the bedroom on the ground floor collapsed, and she was trapped under the rubble,” she said.
Hamish’s eyes lost focus. He staggered, almost freezing in this moment.
Looking up at the sky, snow fell into his eyes, melting into a scorching heat, streaming down his cheeks, grotesque as a demon. His eyes bloodshot, his expression slowly freezing.
Elisa dead? How could she be dead?
Back then he had bullied her, causing her to become a vegetable. She had jumped, crashed cars, and he had signed countless critically ill notices for her, but she hadn’t died. Watching her stomach cancer almost cured a few months ago, how could Elisa be dead?
She must be angry, angry at his engagement to Lila, so she conspired with Mrs. Protich to deceive him.
The day before yesterday, she said she wouldn’t leave, that she would always stay by his side, so… how could she leave him alone?
The surroundings were filled with a mix of voices, but for that moment, Hamish thought he had gone deaf, unable to hear anything.
He found himself in a void, surrounded by darkness. He struggled to find Elisa’s figure but couldn’t.
He wanted to make a sound, to scream, but his throat felt like it was being choked. A chilling wind blew past his ears, and his body staggered forward. At that moment, everything in sight turned gray.
“Is Elisa throwing a tantrum at home? Give her the phone, I’ll coax her. Doesn’t she like desserts and dumplings from this place? I’ll go buy them…” Hamish blurted out, almost breathless. Hearing no response on the other end of the line, his throat tightened, and he asked cautiously, “Is she refusing to answer the phone? It’s okay… tell her I’ll be back soon, ask her to wait for me…”
Mrs. Protich covered her mouth, watching the sky stained with fire, and choked, “Mr. Burns, Mrs. Burns can’t wait for you anymore…”
As Hamish listened to Mrs. Protich’s words, a desolate emotion slowly seeped from the depths of his heart, staining a colorless, pure water red.
“Her legs couldn’t move, why can’t she wait for me?”
Mrs. Protich hoarsely said, “Because she couldn’t move her legs, she was trapped in the bedroom. The fire engulfed her, she couldn’t escape…”
Mrs. Protich’s words struck him like a heavy hammer on his heart. He clutched his chest, his heart pounding, a strong suffocating feeling almost driving him mad.
“Mr. Burns… you better come and see for yourself.”
The call ended, and Hamish stood still. His eyes were vacant, like an old machine, devoid of spirit, his reactions slowing down…
Suddenly, he rushed out frantically, the biting cold wind hitting his face, making it numb.
“Mr. Burns, where are you going?”
“Mr. Burns?”
“Why the rush? Is something urgent?”
“A perfectly good engagement turned into a farce, the fiancée cheated, and then the fire… such bad luck.”
“…”
Hamish’s bloodshot eyes frightened many. He rushed wordlessly to his car, oblivious to everything else, his mind filled with one thought-going back to see Elisa.
He wouldn’t believe videos, he wouldn’t believe Finn, and he certainly wouldn’t believe Mrs. Protich. Elisa must be at home, waiting for him with the cat.
Hamish, in a state of disarray, drove recklessly, running red lights and tailgating, a journey back to the villa that should have taken two hours. Every moment was a struggle; he desperately wished that everything that had happened that day was just a terrible dream, and that Elisa would be by his side when he woke up.
Due to excessive fear, Hamish’s lips had lost their color. He clenched his teeth, his jaw tight, his eyes showing an indiscernible deep blackness, much like a terminally ill patient struggling at death’s door.
…
The ground floor of the villa was now a ruin, chaos reigning. Surrounding it was a police cordon, with several fire engines flashing nearby. Amidst the heavy snow, a red umbrella sheltered a small area.
But Hamish’s eyes werefixed on the ground floor bedroom, the place where Elisa had stayed after her legs were broken. He had arranged it according to her preferences, warm hues with sunflowers facing the sun, full of vitality.
But now, it was a wasteland. Smoke billowed into the sky, blending with the misty air, as if it could collapse at any moment.
Hamish stumbled out of the car. He clung to the car door, the wind stinging his eyes, struggling to keep them open. His face, cold and numb, he reached up to touch it, not ice, but tears streaming from his eyes.
At this point, Hamish was still deceiving himself. Elisa must be fine. Good people get rewarded; she must be safe. Perhaps she had already come out, there was no one amidst the ruins.
She was so strong, so proud, and clean. How could she allow herself to be burned alive in a fire, how painful that would be…
Hamish racked his brain for hope that Elisa was alive, but there was none. He had destroyed any hope she had of living.
She had no children, no family, and no lover. When he first met her, he thought of her as a thorny rose, but as time went on, she seemed more like a cactus, covered in thorns, yet full of life.
And now, the thorns of the cactus had all fallen off, immersed in the waters of despair, the roots rotting. The once thorny cactus had become soft, easily crushed at the touch…
… No matter how resilient life can be, there comes a day to die.
After getting out of the car, Hamish’s feet seemed rooted to the ground, unable to move an inch.
Firefighters were clearing the scene, desperately trying to dig Elisa out from under the rubble.
When he saw the charred, broken wheelchair thrown out of the rubble, it felt as if someone had gouged Hamish’s heart out while it was still beating.
A voice resounded in his mind before he could speak: Elisa!
The atmosphere at the scene was heavy, voices clamoring, firefighters in protective gear carefully moving debris.
“Why is there a cat running in here? Get out, this is no place for you to play.”
“This little guy is covered in blood, probably injured in the explosion, lucky to be alive. It’s probably the pet of the owner of this house…”
A cat, drenched in blood, emerged from an inconspicuous corner, usually so affectionate, but now its fur bristled, wary of the strangers in front of it.
It leaped past those who reached out to it, then ran toward the rubble that the firefighters had just dug up. Its front paws were bloody and mangled, yet it seemed impervious to pain as it dug through the wreckage, emitting mournful cries.