Wang YiBo decided to propose to his longtime boyfriend, Xiao Zhan, in his unusual but not unwanted way. Yet after a week of being engaged, Wang YiBo disappeared without a trace, leaving Xiao Zhan devastated and heartbroken.
For three years, Xiao Zh...
I clenched my fists tight, the skin over my whitened knuckles stretched taut from the tension in my body. Looking at our apartment, mine and Xiao Zhan's home for the past two years, I painfully said my goodbyes. Every picture we bought together, every furniture we picked out, every fucking memory I cherished was here in this home. But now I have to go, to leave everything that was near and dear to my heart.
A sob escaped my lips, and I quickly slapped a hand over my mouth trying hard to hold back the moisture pooling in my eyes. I didn't want to leave him, didn't want to be apart from him, not even for a second. But how could I stay? How could I condemn him to a lifetime of hell? The regrets, the guilt that would one day come to bite him in the ass. How could I force him to choose knowing how he feels? To force his hand... to make him decide—
Fuck!
Yesterday we were planning our wedding and now... My chest shook with suppressed emotions, and I slowly let out a ragged breath. How the fuck did everything go so wrong?
Shaking my head, my lower lip quivering ever so slightly, I let the tears fall silently down my cheeks. Either way my Zhan-ge chooses, it would break his heart and I'd rather he hated me than hate himself. I closed my eyes, knowing what I was about to do was for the best.
Next thing I knew, memories of that night came barreling through my mind like a torrential thunderstorm and I wept as it consumed me...
"Zhan-ge?" I asked softly.
"Hm?" He murmured groggily. His hands were ready to drag me back to bed, but I pulled back. He opened one eye to stare at me. "What is it?"
"Sit up for a sec."
"Okayyyy..." He drawled slowly, a curious expression on his face.
As he sat half-naked in front of me, I had to force myself to look away from that mouthwatering bulge beneath the sheets to take out a little blue box. Opening it, I presented it to him.
He gasped and covered his mouth with his hand.
"Bo-di!" Tears filled his eyes, and I could see his throat working hard to hold it in.
Smiling at his emotional state, I asked playfully, "Well, are you going to accept it or not?"
The next second, a naked, shaking bundle flew across the bed and into my arms. "Yes! Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. A hundred times, yes!" His arms clung to me as if he were the kraken and I a ship caught in its grasp. But I could not be happier.
"So, can I put it on your finger now? Claim you as mine?"
His tight grip on my body eased, but he didn't let go. Moving back until he could see my face, he breathed, "Yes! Oh Bo-di, love. Yes, I'm yours. Always and forever." Then he lifted his hand, wiggling his fingers at me. The smile on his face made my heart leap out of my chest as I slowly slid the engagement ring onto his finger.
Leaning my forehead against his, our breaths mingling, I whispered tenderly, "I love you, with all my heart, all my being. You are my beginning and my end. I will follow you to the ends of the earth because where you are, is where I will always be. In this world, in this lifetime and every lifetime I will ever have, I will always be yours because without you, there is no me. Without you, I do not exist."
"Bo-di," he whispered brokenly, his emotions making him choke up. "I love you too, my Bo-di." His teary voice was soft and endearing as he said my name, then he pulled me close. It melted my heart the way he reverently kissed me, again and again until I felt my body soaring. I could never get enough of him.
"I love you too, my Zhan-ge!" I whispered in a choppy breath, then grimaced as the memory faded and reality set in, shredding the very walls I just erected around my broken heart. Once again, despair hit me and all I could do was stand motionless as it wreaked havoc within me.
I didn't know how much time had passed, but I knew I had to leave before he got home. If I see him now, I might have the strength to go through with this. With a broken sob, I murmured into the empty apartment. "I hope when you come home, you won't find this place too lonely without me. Live, Zhan-ge. I want you to live happy and..." The lump in my throat refused to go away. "Be happy," I rasped hoarsely, my body unable to stop shaking knowing this will be the last time I will ever see him.
The night I proposed to him would be forever imprinted in my heart, on my soul. A memory to last me a lifetime of loneliness, of heartache, of pain.
Had I known this day would happen, I wouldn't have proposed to him. I would have never put my ring on his finger. Now I must live with that image the rest of my life.
Leaving him was the hardest thing I have ever had to do... but for him, I had to do it.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
(Note: Just a short story. Hope you enjoy the read!)
