The Ninety-Ninth Spring Goodbye

Vivian Grant lost her memory and forgot everything about me.

Her memory stopped in the year when she loved her ex-husband most.

No matter how the people around her tried to explain it, she still believed I was the third party who had come between them.

The doctors said her amnesia might be treatable, so I held on to that hope and refused to let go.

For three years, we got divorced and remarried over and over again.

We became the biggest joke in the city's elite circles. Some people even started betting on us.

They bet on when I would finally give up, and when Vivian would finally remember.

Then news of our eighth divorce hit the trending charts again.

Reporters rushed into the law firm with cameras on their shoulders.

They shoved microphones in my face, their questions full of provocation.

"Mr. Sterling, as a divorce attorney, how does it feel to have been divorced eight times yourself?"

The firm's sign was smashed. The commendation banners clients had given me were trampled underfoot.

Before I could respond, my supervisor fired me for damaging the profession's reputation.

"Julian Sterling, let me give you some advice. Have some self-respect. Stop clinging to Ms. Grant."

I clenched my trembling hands and suddenly felt exhausted.

They were right.

This time, I really should give up.

It was still pouring when I left the law firm.

I carried the box from my desk and went home in a daze.

The door was not fully closed. From inside came bursts of laughter from Vivian Grant and Nolan Ash.

I looked around.

The place was a mess. Clothes were scattered across the floor. The carpet was stained.

On the living room TV, the news kept replaying today's scandal at the firm.

When Vivian saw me come back, the smile on her face faded.

"You still have the nerve to come back."

Her mocking words reached my ears clearly.

Nolan laughed and kissed the corner of Vivian's mouth.

"Come on. You were together for seven years. Leave him a little dignity."

Then he looked up, raised an eyebrow at me, and smiled with deliberate suggestiveness.

"Vivian's ovulating today. She wanted me badly. You don't mind, right?"

Rain dripped from my hair onto the floor.

A wave of exhaustion rose in my chest.

I did not look at the two naked people on the couch again. I turned and walked toward the bedroom.

But the moment I pushed the door open, I froze.

"Oh, right. I forgot to tell you.

"This house is also under my mother's name. It has nothing to do with you. I threw all your things out.

"They should still be by the trash cans on the roadside."

Vivian's mouth curved upward. She had thrown on a jacket at random and was leaning against the wall as she watched me.

It was as if seeing me humiliated made her happy.

Pain clenched in my chest.

My soaked shirt made my whole body cold.

"You bought today's trending topic too, didn't you?

"We're already divorced. Why did you still have to cost me my job?"

At my question, Vivian raised her hand and knocked the box out of my arms.

Papers and files scattered across the floor.

They were nearly seven years of my work.

"Was three years of pestering me not enough? Even if there really was something between us before, I have amnesia now.

"If I forgot you, that means you were worthless to me!"

Those words stabbed straight into the wound again.

Three years ago, she suddenly lost her memory and forgot everything about me.

The day before she lost her memory, she had told me she was pregnant.

She had pulled me excitedly around the house, decorating the nursery and wondering whether the baby would be a boy or a girl.

But afterward, she forgot.

She remembered only Nolan.

She aborted our child. For Nolan, she even had a hymen reconstruction.

"You only forgot! You have no idea what Nolan did back then..."

Resentment and anger nearly drove me insane.

Vivian's face turned livid. She grabbed my hand hard and shoved me out the door.

The rain soaked me all over again.

"I don't care what Nolan did. I only remember that I love him. That's enough."

I opened my mouth, but suddenly every question, every grievance, seemed pointless.

Vivian avoided my eyes in irritation. Then she pulled the wedding ring off her finger.

The diamond's edge cut her skin.

She threw the ring at my feet, and as she slammed the door, she left one last sentence behind.

"Stop begging me to remarry you like some pathetic dog."

I stood there for a long time. Finally, I crouched down and picked up the ring.

Before our wedding, Vivian had designed it herself.

She had worn it for seven years and had never once taken it off.

By the roadside trash cans were our shattered wedding portrait, the scarf she had knitted for me by hand, and every album that held memories of us.

My phone suddenly rang.

I looked at the contact name and answered.

Mrs. Grant's excited voice came through.

"Julian, I just got Vivian's physical report. The doctor said her memory is loosening.

"If she keeps receiving treatment, there is an eighty percent chance she can recover!"

My fingers tightened around the phone until my knuckles turned white.

The word okay reached my lips, but I could not say it.

In the end, I said softly, "Mom, let's stop the treatment. If she's forgotten, then let her forget."