Eye, You, Mouth (2)

Fang Hanmo.

It was probably Jie Moshu's mortal name at that time, like Fang Shenghao. Looking at how long the Fangs family had been serving him, they must have been very loyal.

At some point, we made it to the current estate of the Fangs family—Jie Moshu's luxurious mansion. Not that I would say it looked exactly the same, just a bit old-fashioned in design and more oriental touch.

When I was brought to the memory, Jie Moshu was already sitting on the yellowish chesterfield sofa, legs stretched out in front of him.

"Tea, "Jie Moshu gestured to the girl sitting across the table to drink the well prepared dried herbs inside.

She nodded. Her hands were shaking as she took the cup for having a sip. I believed her cheeks still stung from those harsh slaps before, leaving red stains burning her skin.

But her actions, shouldn't have surprised me. The girl might not have been accustomed to how Jie Moshu treated her since she was a maidservant at the bar. And, honestly, I couldn't blame her; a person with disabilities. She must have engraved it her deepest level of instinct, adopting all the same attitude to sense danger and smell fear. Some called her being ungrateful. I called it being cautious.

Jie Moshu noticed the girl looking at him, and tried to correct his expression into a more appropriate one. The reassuring smile reached to his eyes, and the graciousness I found there set my heart thudding in my chest.

"So, how do you like tea?"He smiled, the sunlight hit his dark eyes so I could see gold flecks in them.

I felt like odds were slipping as if I had been petrified in acid. What did he do? He was only smiling. But watching him, my blood pumped faster in my ears. I glanced away to the window, blinking, very fast. My hands were pressing on my mouth, attempted to breathe normally, my pulse still trying to jump from my skin.

Oh shit. Obviously, there was something wrong with me. At once my mind zigzags like lightning. But what, exactly? I gave an anxious sweeping gaze from Jie Moshu and back to the girl. Having afternoon tea? Freeing her from slavery? Surely not. I looked around at the girl, she seemed frozen as well. Her jaw had tensed and her eyes were alert.

What? Was she feeling perplexed by him smiling as well?

As I looked at her closely, I didn't think that was the case in this matter. Rather the question Jie Moshu had asked that seemed troubling her.

She didn't respond to his question—of course, she was struggling to answer him. Instead, there was still complete silence from her, which surprised me. She had turned so pale, I was almost worried that she would faint or whatsoever. Her hands were frozen still around the teacup, and there was an odd expression on her face.

The girl shook her head gloomily.

His brow furrowed. "Why doesn't it suit your liking? Should I change it?"

She almost flinched at his worried tone and some tea splashed to the carpet. As she set the teacup down on the side table, she hastily shook her head. For the very first time, the smallest smile touched her lips. It was barely there, but I counted that as one. Then slowly, subtly, she touched her nose and mouth, then shook her head.

A powerful shock surged straight to me. I almost stumbled, my legs were trembling. I felt like scoffing, and I was breathless.

Not only was she a deaf-mute, but she also lost her senses of smell and taste? The thoughts shot my brain before I could stop them. God, I felt as though I might scream out of frustration. It was unfair for her—for me as well, she was practically my past life. I regarded her with a kind of pity. At last, I glanced at Jie Moshu, who seemed equally surprised at the fact.

"I see…" he said. "That was very inconsiderate of me."

Again, she shook her head, but she was smiling fully now. And she had a beautiful smile, which I knew it was shameless for me to say this.

That was why the people in the bar treated her like a disposable pawn. Because not only she couldn't speak nor hear, she was also lacking in her senses. She wasn't perfect, but at least she was hard working. I could tell that.

There was a long, agonizing silence. I clearly didn't know which way this would swing. The girl's eyes were unfocused, sadness and heartache shimmered through her gaze.

I knew Jie Moshu also had realized that. That was why he left his sofa, coming over to sit beside the girl.

She turned her attention to Jie Moshu, staring in surprise. Though she wasn't with her words, I felt her; the way her heart raced or how her palms grew damp as he loomed over her. We were connected in some way and somehow.

Her eyes moved to Jie Moshu's lips as he uttered his next words. "Do you write?"

While her eyes locked to his dark eyes, her lips peeled back to show a weak smile. Again, she shook her head.

"That doesn't matter, I can teach you."

He reached over and gently took her hand in his. On her palm, he wrote some strokes of Chinese characters. I saw the changing expression on the girl's face that I almost felt little rough calluses on his index finger as though her palm was mine as well.

She frowned deeply, tilted her head, looking at Jie Moshu with utter perplexity.

"Tea, bitter," he said. "Do you know the taste of bitter?"

She shook her head.

"Hmm. It's like when you feel sad or in pain, a taste that you hardly agree to. The tea now has become a little bit cold, but when you drink tea while it's hot, it'll soothe you. Like a remedy, when you've gone through pain and taking that as an experience, moving forward. That's tea for bitterness."

She nodded to him knowing that she somehow had gotten the taste of the tea through his explanation.

"Do you have anything else you wanted to know about?"

Then she gestured at those biscuits aligned on the table, still silent as the grave.

After writing on her palm, Jie Moshu looked up, meeting her eyes once more. "Biscuits, sweet. A feeling when you are extremely happy like you've won a lottery. Opposite from bitter actually, the flavor that everyone mostly loves. But too much sweetness can also cause someone to get bored. So, it's best to have tea and biscuits together to balance the taste."

The girl mouthed an "ah" as she nodded, simply giving a knowing smile to him. Her hand then pointed at Jie Moshu itself.

A smile crept to his thin lips, his hand again stroke some characters on her hand. His lips moved for another word. "Name, Jie Moshu. But for what kind of person I am, I believe in time you might learn it well."

I watched the girl's reaction carefully, she gave him an appreciating smile in return. But of course, my brilliant wits knew which way this scenario was heading.

The longer you had seen those dramas and novels, I hardly could close an eye to these sparks of something. The heroic man and the girl he saved. Cliché. With that kind of sweet, shy smile, I had known this much.

Wait—

What the hell? Did I just analyze this? Why was I overreacting?

I froze, totally freaked out with myself in a way I didn't expect myself to be. The air seemed to have gone blurry. I didn't know if I even could breathe properly.

For a moment my heart was flipping over before I realized watching this scene made me feel the bitterness like Jie Moshu said. A peculiar kind of pain entered my body and crept to my chest.

God, I hated this.

I felt as though my whole meeting with Jie Moshu, I had been playing around with worries. Like mini-worries. I mean, I always called him a "no-brainer opportunist", rolling my eyes, pushing him out of my life without actually knowing I had entangled myself more than I realized.

But now a genuine, scary worry was looming over me, like Everest. When you were worried, you went silent and picked at your fingernails. That was exactly what I was doing.

I flinched. I couldn't be bothered if Jie Moshu regarded me with the feelings from my past lives, right? No. It couldn't be. This was probably because I had been too immersed with the current me from my past life.

I definitely do not like what this memory was taking me. I didn't even bother wondering or wanting to remember any parts of my past self alone with him. All those details of how they had been together, the things they had shared. No, I wasn't interested at all, full stop.

But my heart pulsed inevitably. Dammit.

Nah, I was probably thinking too much about it. I was sure everything would be alright. I was sure of it.