It was on these nights – these grave, dark, lonesome nights – did Chang'e feel hollow and grieving. Her clammy hands stirred a hotpot for her husband to come home for. She knew she for herself would not be the one to carry his feet to their old house, after all she had grown the age of forty. Any sensible man with desires still aflame within him would brush off a forty-year-old woman from his attention. Hou Yi's attention stayed on the giggling girls who passed the crossroads near the fields in the evening, their tight uniform accentuating their curves, billowing hair like hook-attached tassels snatching the sun-dulled eyes of farmers young and aged.
Other wives would snap at their husbands, strip their desires bare for them to glimpse in the mirror. But Chang'e could not bear to do such a thing to her husband. She loved him too much, and would do anything to defend his honour. Rumour of Hou Yi's unwavering moral compass rippled through the village. The other farmers' wives would tell her during little gatherings, "You are so lucky, Chang'e. Your husband's so loyal to you." Chang'e's smile never reached her eyes, ever since her birthdays had turned more and more forgotten. Curling to a wisp of smoke from the years of her husband's memory.
In truth, all her husband ever did was stare at the passing girls. His face conveyed young enough an age to be kissable by the school girls. Sometimes, he returned home with the scent of parchment and expensive perfume clinging to his t-shirts, and whenever Chang'e leaned on her tip-toes and pressed a kiss on her husband's lips, she tasted a faint sweetness, like those fruity lip-glosses that no longer suited her. He never kissed back. She would let go, and all warmth leeched out of her heart at the distracted look on Hou Yi's heartbreakingly-handsome face. Distracted with something else. With the new flavour on his lips, with the new scent on his clothes.
Pain smote her heart every time she thought about it.
And yet, Chang'e still wondered why her heart still ached for him so. As though a part of her hoped he would come back to her.
So, when he brought home a little glass bottle, crusted with earth and the strange liquid inside it aglow, and he begged her to keep it safe, protect it with her life, Chang'e said yes. Although her heart clenched at her weakening resolve to protect her own honour.
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THE DREAMER'S LAMENT
Short StoryIn the hearts of dreamers, lament will always linger. Sadness can bloom into the brightest, lambent shades, like the rain giving way to the phantom of a rainbow, like the promise of hope. But sorrow may also wind down a darker, colder path. Our hear...
