❝BACKTOTHETIME❞

Like some sort of a robber, Wu Zheng bombarded into their house, the door hitting the wall hard.  He left it open, not caring about anything else other than his daughter.  He had lost his wife; he can't lose his daughter now, too.  He prayed in his head that he wasn't too late.

Vickie was pale, her eyes closed peacefully, as she was picked up by her dad and brought out to the car.  She was still breathing, but it was slowing down.  Wu Zheng checked her pulse:  he couldn't feel anything.

Fortunately, the road was almost empty.  Wu Zheng drove furiously to the hospital to have her checked.  He carried his daughter out of the car carefully then, closing and locking the car, he brought her inside the hospital.

He was greeted by a female nurse motioning for a hospital bed to come for Vickie.  Wu Zheng laid her there and had four male other nurses bring Vickie into the emergency room.  He had no idea if it was an emergency matter, but the nurses knew better than him.  The female assured him that everything will be okay and that he should wait outside the emergency room.  Wu Zheng obeyed her then the nurse left him pacing back and forth in the hallway.

Different nurses exited the emergency room each hour, and each time Wu Zheng would ask if Vickie was alright, if anything was wrong.  They couldn't give him straight answers, so they just assured him just like what the female nurse had told him hours earlier.  Another nurse exited the emergency room at one-thirty in the afternoon.  She told Wu Zheng that he could come in the room to check on his daughter.

“I- Is she alright?  Is there anything wrong?  Please tell me, I need to know!”  Wu Zheng pleaded the nurse.

“Sir, sir, calm down.”  The nurse said.  “Your daughter is in good hands.  Any other questions will be answered by the doctor.”

“T- Thank you,”  Wu Zheng sighed then walked inside the emergency room.

He found Vickie sleeping peacefully on the hospital bed, a mask on her face connected by a tube to an oxygen tank.  She was now wearing a hospital robe in white with patterns in blue.  It broke Wu Zheng's heart to see her in such state.  A doctor holding a clipboard was on the other side of Vickie's bed, checking something on the monitor and on other hospital machines in the room.

“Doctor, is Vickie alright now?  What happened?”  Wu Zheng asked the doctor quietly.

The doctor turned around and removed his mask.  “Ah, my suspections were right.  You are Song Wu Zheng, owner of the mighty Song Electric Company.  Nice to meet you, sir, I am Doctor Lim.”

Wu Zheng shook Doctor Lim's hand.  “Nice to meet you, too, sir.  How is my daughter doing?”

“We are still running some tests on her, sir.”  Doctor Lim replied, writing something on his clipboard.  “But I am afraid she will have to stay in the hospital for some time.”

“It's alright, as long as she gets better, she will stay here.  Do your best, Doctor Lim, please.  I can't lose my daughter.”  Wu Zheng begged, tears about to form in his eyes.

Doctor Lim closed his clipboard.  “I will do my best and all the other doctors here, sir.  Our patients' health is our priority.  Your daughter will be transferred to her hospital room later today.  If you will excuse me.”

“Thank you so much, Doctor Lim, thank you,”  Wu Zheng thanked the doctor from the bottom of his heart.  Doctor Lim bowed at him and exited the emergency room.

Later that day, just as Doctor Lim mentioned, Vickie was transferred to her hospital bedroom.  The mask from her face was removed, much to Wu Zheng's relief.  In her hospital room, everything was white apart from the paintings on the wall and the flowers in the vase right beside her hospital bed.  A huge window was placed to the right of her bed, so the buildings were viewable from where she laid down.

Wu Zheng still hadn't had his lunch.  It was now three in the afternoon, and the sun outside was shining brightly.  He gave up some minutes later and bought two chicken congee from the hospital's cafeteria, bringing the congee to Vickie's room.  He sat on a chair facing Vickie's bed, eating his late lunch.

Vickie's eyes slowly began to open, the light in her hospital room almost blinding her.  She closed them again, then slowly opened them again to adjust to the light.  Wu Zheng noticed this, so he quickly placed his meal on the coffee table behind him.

“Vickie, sweetie?  It's dad.”  Wu Zheng called out softly.

“Dad?  W- Where... Where am I?”  Vickie asked.  The voice she heard was still processing in her head.

“You're in the hospital, dear.  Don't worry, you're all right now.”  Wu Zheng comforted his daughter.

“Hospital?”  Vickie repeated.

“Yes, darling”—Vickie struggled to sit up, so Wu Zheng helped her—“Vickie, be careful, you're still recovering.”

“Dad, w- what happened?”  Vickie asked, her face scrunched up as she tried to sit up.

“Well, you called me earlier today, then I guess you fell on the ground.  I came back home and found you lying on the floor.  You were pale, darling.  Did you eat breakfast?”  Wu Zheng asked tenderly.

“I... Well, n- not really,”  Vickie was barely audible.

“Vickie, you should have eaten.  Look, now you're in the hospital.”  Wu Zheng sat back down in the chair beside Vickie's bed, Vickie's congee in his hands.  He scooped a little of the congee with a spoon then fed Vickie.

The warm congee felt good in Vickie's body.  She was eating the congee slowly, then she ate them all by herself to finish it.  She thought she was beginning to feel alright.  Wu Zheng watched her as she ate.  While Vickie was eating, the sleeve of her robe folded back, revealing a medium-sized bruise on her arm.  Wu Zheng stopped Vickie for a second.

“Vickie, you have a bruise.  Where did you get this?”  Wu Zheng said, standing up and holding Vickie's arm, caressing the bruise.

Vickie looked at her arm and the bruise on it.  “I- I really don't know, dad.  I didn't even know I had one.”

Wu Zheng called for a doctor to inspect the bruise on Vickie's arm.  It wasn't Doctor Lim since he introduced himself as Doctor Chiu.  Doctor Chiu told Wu Zheng that Vickie will have to undergo further tests.  It might only be a bruise, he said, but it could also be an early symptom of a disease.

“A disease?”  Vickie asked, making the two gentlemen turn their heads to her.

Doctor Chiu decided to answer her.  “We still don't know, that's good news.  You will be doing tests with another doctor either tonight or tomorrow, and we'll figure it out from there.”

Wu Zheng left Vickie alone after Doctor Chiu had left.  He verified when Vickie will take the tests, and he found out that tomorrow she will start.  He thanked the nurse who had told him that then went back to Vickie's hospital room.

“Dad?”

“Yes, darling?”  Wu Zheng kept on mixing the spaghetti with the sauce.  That was the only light dinner he could find in the cafeteria.

“How did mom die?”

Wu Zheng stopped.  He recalled memories even when he didn't want to.  His eyes were closed as he answered Vickie,  “‘How did mom die’?”

“Yes, dad,”  Vickie replied,  “I want to know how mom died.”

Wu Zheng brought the spaghetti to Vickie to which she accepted with a thank you.  Wu Zheng sat down in the chair and contemplated whether he would tell Vickie the truth or brush it off just as he did before.  He chose the prior.

“Your mom and I were married for four years at that time, and you were just about to turn four years old.  One night, we had this... this really bad fight and your mom called me and told me that she loved me, she loved you, but she couldn't do it anymore.  I told her I was sorry, begged her to come back home because you were looking for her.  She didn't answer me, instead she hung up on me.”

“Then,”  Vickie said,  “What happened?”

“The entire night I was worried.  I didn't sleep.  The next morning after I have dropped you off Mama's house, I was watching the morning news.  Part of the breaking news was a... suicide accident that happened in a beach in Kenting.  They said it happened at a cliff the night before.  The camera recorded the busy retrieval operation of the body, and they found out the identity of the person.  It was Wong Mei Lu... your mother.”  Wu Zheng paused for a second, letting out a sad chuckle.  “The thing was... your mom and I met in Kenting during my internship.”

Vickie felt a twitch in her head and in her chest as she listened to her dad.  Her mother died by taking her own life at a cliff, in a beach.  Those words rung in her head like a church bell being rung continuously.  She remembered herself singing and being in another world, where her role was to sit at the edge of a cliff and stare ahead at the endless water beneath her.

“I- I'm sorry, dad, I shouldn't have asked,”  Vickie lowered her head, staring at her spaghetti dinner.

Wu Zheng grinned sadly,  “It's alright, darling.  You had to know about it eventually.  It's okay.”

But it wasn't okay.  Everything was simultaneous.  It's probably just a coincidence, Vickie thought.  But, again, it wasn't.  If it was a coincidence, it would have left Vickie's mind already.  However, it didn't.  In her head before and as she slept were two people:  Jinki and her mother.

SO UM THIS WILL PROBABLY BE THE LAST UPADTE OF THE DAY

/OMG LIGHTNING.

IT'S CURRENTLY RAINING OVER HERE IN HOUSTON, OR PROBABLY JUST THE PART OF HOUSTON WHERE I LIVE.  BUT OMG LIGHTNING.

WELL HI NEW SUBSCRIBER~!

I LOVE YOU ALL~

OMG LIGHTNING

THANK YOU GUYS FOR READING!