After Mr. White heard that Louis was out of danger and breathed a sigh of relief, he focused all his attention on his wife. He embraced her, gently patting her back and stroking her hair, soothing her softly, “It’s okay, there’s nothing to be afraid of.”
Mrs. White softly murmured “Mm” and was then taken to the ICU.
Elisa, watching the figures of the White family, abruptly halted her previously raised steps. Micah, noticing her standing still, casually asked, “Aren’t you going in to see?”
Elisa didn’t respond to him; instead, she turned to meet his eyes and spoke five words, “Micah, thank you.”
Micah paused for a moment, then smiled sadly, “You are remarkably similar to a friend of mine, not only in name but also in appearance. However, she wasn’t as fortunate as you… When she was your age, she got stomach cancer, took medicine every day, suffered domestic abuse, and ultimately died in a fire. I never got to see her one last time.”
That was all a long time ago, but every time he accidentally thought about it, he couldn’t help but shed tears. Micah’s eyes were already red from exhaustion, now filled with bloodshot veins, accentuating his increasingly pallid face.
Elisa bit her lip, ultimately not expressing her inner thoughts. To her, her past self had already died. For Micah, that Elisa had also found release in the fire. Now, everyone has a new life…
After a moment of silence, Elisa steadied her voice and said, “To her, having you is her fortune. She can still be remembered by so many people. After enduring so much suffering in her past life, in her next life, heaven will surely treat her kindly. You don’t need to be sad about the past; you have already done so well, exceptionally well.”
Having said that, her heart twitched uncontrollably for a moment. Elisa smiled, turned slowly, took a few steps, and Micah suddenly called out to her from behind.
“Elisa.” Micah’s eyes were red, and he looked at the thin figure of this woman. How could she look so much like her? Just like before, merely looking at her made him feel distressed.
Micah struggled to suppress his boiling emotions, but his choked voice still leaked out. He asked uncontrollably, “Elisa, are you going home?”
In truth, he already knew.
Elisa’s lips trembled uncontrollably, her breathing became louder, and she suddenly remembered, several years ago, Uncle Qin stood behind her and said the same thing.
-“Elisa, are you going home?”
But at that time, she already had no home.
Elisa looked back, her beautiful eyes regained their luster. Her choked throat uttered words with a heavy tone, and she gently shook her head, “I have found a new home, so I won’t go back…”
After saying that, she dared not look at Micah’s expression. She stiffly moved her legs and unsteadily walked into the ICU.
Louis lay quietly on the bed, the ICU room was very bright, illuminating even the veins under his skin. Wrapped in a blanket, his pale face looked bloodless, and his lips were dry and pale.
Elisa had never seen him so weak, as if he had already entered the halls of the king of the underworld. Perhaps Louis had already stepped in, but he couldn’t bear to leave her, so he returned with a breath of life.
The whole family was exhausted, Louis was still in a coma and there was nothing much to take care of. As long as they watched the IV drip and kept an eye on his blood, in addition, the ICU room was never lacking in terms of care, nurses would come to check regularly, and there were hospital attendants too.
Mrs. White looked at Louis with distress. She turned to Elisa, “Elisa, you haven’t rested for too long. Go and have a good rest. I will arrange for a caregiver to look after Louis.”
Elisa shook her head, “I’m not tired.” This was not a lie. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to rest, but her nerves were currently unsettled, and she couldn’t rest even if she wanted to.
“Aunt Burns, you and Uncle should go and rest. I’ll be fine here,” Mr. White started to speak but was stopped by Mrs. White, who shook her head at him.
“Then take good care of Louis. When he wakes up, the first person he would want to see is you.” Just like how they had been talking to him by his bedside for the past dozen hours, but Elisa’s voice on the phone overpowered all their efforts.
Brittany thought the same thing as her mother, “I haven’t showered for several days in the hospital. Since my brother is okay now, I will go home and take a shower. Elisa, I’ll leave it to you here. If there’s anything, please call us, we will come back tomorrow.”
“Okay.” Elisa stood at the door of the ICU room, watching them until they disappeared into the elevator, then she sighed and turned away.
Louis’s lips were once beautiful, but now they have lost their color and become dry. Elisa reached out and touched his dry lips, moistening them with a cotton swab.
“Why did you do something so foolish? I told you, once I received our award, I would come back for you. Why couldn’t you just wait for me? Why did you have to go so far to find me? You big fool.”
No one knew, amidst the bustling crowd, Elisa heard Louis’s voice and saw his figure, and she struggled to control her emotions.
But if it was obtained at the cost of Louis’s pain and life, she would rather not have it.
Elisa held Louis’s hand to her cheek and said with red eyes, “Thank you for loving me so fiercely, thank you for not abandoning me, thank you for keeping your word…”
Elisa remembered the year when Finn raised a gun and shot Louis in the chest right in front of her.
He fell at that time, just like he does now, his face devoid of color, robbed of warmth.
The whole world spun around her. She lay on the ground, her fingers pierced with 28 steel needles. She wanted to reach him, but she couldn’t even move her fingers. All she could do was desperately bite onto Finn’s trouser leg, begging him to give Louis back to her.
Louis was her moonlight, the one she had longed for all her life. Over those ten-plus years, there were several times when she couldn’t carry on, and it was only the memory of “him carrying her home” that got her through.
When she was scolded by her father and brother, she recalled it.
The day her grandfather died, the burden of the Powell family fell on her, and she recalled it.
When she was stared at with strange eyes by the shareholders, she recalled it.
Even when Hamish coldly slapped her in domestic violence, she also recalled it.
Until she got stomach cancer and lost the strength to recollect, she always wondered if the older brother who carried her home and gave her candied haws when she was seven or eight was just a figment of her imagination.
He had clearly promised that when he grew up, he would come find her. So why, when they met, did “he” not recognize her?
When she mistook Hamish, she said these things too, and Hamish called her crazy and delusional.
Alone in the quiet hospital room, where the only sound was the drip of the IV, with no one to disturb her, her mind couldn’t help but recall the past.
She remembered the joys and sorrows of those years, the laughter and the pain.
By the time she realized that marrying Hamish had been a mistake from start to finish, Louis was bleeding in the chest, and he hadn’t had the chance to say much to her.
He only said one thing.
-“Little crybaby, this time I can’t carry you home…”
Even when facing death, his first thought was to carry Elisa home.
When she thought back to why Hamish had hypnotized and brainwashed her, if she woke up remembering everything… she would follow Louis to death.
Hamish knew this very well, so he erased “Autumn” from her memory.
…
In another ward upstairs, the TV was connected to the internet, repeatedly playing Elisa’s live broadcast from seven hours ago.
In the footage, Elisa stood on the stage, announcing her retirement from the entertainment industry, proving in her own way that nothing could hinder her love for Louis. Even though the reporters and netizens around her asked all sorts of unpleasant questions, believing she had caused Louis harm, she showed no sign of backing down or weakness.
Hamish had once praised Elisa for her beautiful eyes, but later, her eyes suddenly lost their sparkle. Now, he could see that Elisa was very tired, yet her eyes still sparkled with hope, and the source of this hope was not him, Hamish, but another man.
Until Louis appeared later, and she lifted her skirt to break through the crowd, throwing herself into his arms without hesitation.
Hamish couldn’t describe how painful he felt, he just knew it was excruciating, an unseen pain, like needles piercing through his entire body. He wished he could pull them out, but he couldn’t even see where the needles had entered. He was powerless to struggle, it pained him to the core.
A cup of hot water doesn’t suddenly cool down; he understood this principle.
Watching the two embrace on the screen, Louis’s declaration of “fiancée” instantly shattered all of his defenses.
He hadn’t had the chance to prove himself, but he had already lost. He was unwilling… truly unwilling.
Elisa, he hadn’t had the chance to have her, but it felt like he had lost her countless times. He loved her and yet he had to let her go; he was unwilling.