“Hannah!” I shrieked. I fastened my gaze on the man she was clinging to. He was tall and attired in a black down jacket. That man wasn’t exactly handsome, but his height and confidence imbued him with a magnetic aura.
The five of us engaged in this stand-off without anyone speaking for a while. I sneaked a peek at John and noticed that his face had grown thunderous and his eyes wild. After a long while, John spluttered, “How long has it been?”
Hannah looked unaffected as she casually replied, “A few months.” Those words, and all the enormity of their meaning, hung in the air between us.
John suddenly gave a loud snort. Flashing her a scornful look, he asked, “Why?”
“There’s no reason why, John. All relationships must come to an end somehow,” Hannah said breezily. Her manner seemed entirely frivolous.
Hearing her response, John hung his head. He seemed to be laughing at the sheer absurdity of the situation as his shoulders shook uncontrollably. Undoubtedly, he was unable to restrain himself any further as his emotions swelled within him and burst out in a torrent.
Without hesitation, John lunged forward and punched the other man hard in the face. Due to the pure impulse of his move, however, John’s blow did not land as well as he had probably hoped it would.
I expected Hannah to cry out in indignation or beg for mercy, but she remained unflappable. She merely crossed her arms and retreated. It was as if she was a mere spectator of the fight rather than its motive.
Meanwhile, Ashton drew me behind him protectively. We, too, watched on without intervening.
It was only when it seemed that John was on the verge of beating the other man to death that Hannah finally spoke.
“Let him go, John. If you’re still mad, take it out on me. He doesn’t know what’s going on at all,” she said with an aggravating coolness.
John paused and looked at her savagely. His eyes were bloodshot. However, he simmered down and slowly walked over to Hannah. “What do you want?” he asked with difficulty.
I had always known that John was in love with Hannah. He had his demons, and to him, Hannah had always been a place of refuge from the rest of the world. I suppose John had always firmly believed that Hannah would never leave nor betray him. In his mind, Hannah was the lighthouse that would always be waiting patiently back at the shore for him to sail home.
Yet John had forgotten that people were terribly fickle beings. He had made Hannah wait for him for too long a time. She was a woman, after all, and needed a man to love and care for her. After some time, Hannah had finally grown weary of being left out in the cold.
Hannah looked at John. She either did not notice the melancholy in his eyes or merely refused to see it. Exhaling deeply, Hannah said, “Kiki belongs to the Stovall family, so I won’t take him with me. The villa and the car are both under your name, so I’ll return them to you. As for everything else, let me keep them. I’ll take them as a reward for staying by your side all these years.”
Hannah let out a deep breath, then laughed mournfully. “There isn’t much else. Other than Kiki, we don’t have any other common possessions. At least the legal side of things won’t be too complicated. If you don’t have time or energy to care for Kiki, I will. However, you’ll need to pay child support. I won’t ask for anything else from you.”
It was heartrending to see a relationship reduced thus to the stark, bare-bones of assets and payments. There was nothing left to say between John and Hannah. Even goodbye felt redundant.
John’s emotions had gradually subsided. He then merely replied, “We’ll talk about it when we get back.”
Without waiting for Hannah’s response, John walked heavily towards his car. He started it and drove off without a second glance at anyone else.
Ashton and I remained where we were. As for Hannah, she watched as John’s car gradually vanished in the distance, then turned towards the man sitting on the ground. “Are you all right?” she asked nonchalantly.
The man softened and patted Hannah’s arm reassuringly. “I’m fine.”
I stared at them, lost for words. After a while, we simply turned and walked away.
Feeling heavyhearted, I remained silent even after we’d gotten back to the car and driven off.
“Don’t worry. I’ve sent someone to follow John. He’ll be fine!” Ashton said reassuringly beside me.
I looked at him, then replied shortly, “I’m not worried about John. It’s Hannah I’m concerned about. She was clearly in love with John. Why did she suddenly decide to give up their relationship?”
Ashton rested one hand on the steering wheel, his elbow on the door of the car, a picture of placid serenity. With an air of wisdom, he philosophized, “Autumn doesn’t arrive in the middle of spring. And when it does, the leaves on the trees don’t fall all at once. Perhaps Hannah was made to wait for too long and lost hope in the relationship.”
I bit my lip and turned away. Unbeknownst to Ashton, I was no stranger to that feeling.
I’d drifted off to sleep on the drive back, and Ashton had picked me up and carried me straight into the bedroom. I opened my eyes blearily to look at Ashton, who was getting undressed and ready to shower at the side of the room. “I don’t know what’s happening to me lately,” I moaned. “I get drowsy very quickly and feel rather weak.”
Ashton froze at my offhand remark, his hands arrested in the middle of taking his shirt off. He lowered them slowly and turned to me with a peculiar beam on his face. Delighted, he proclaimed, “We’ll make a trip to the hospital tomorrow!”
