"Creak." The mind cottage faithfully reproduced the details of his memories; even the door still made that faint noise.
Light spilled from the bedroom through the open door, casting a long, narrow shadow behind Zhang Xiao... a lonely shadow.
"What was I expecting...?" Zhang Xiao shook his head with a bitter smile. The curtains stirred gently, just as he remembered. The bedroom held familiar furniture and familiar decorations, but not the familiar people.
He walked inside with mixed emotions. A photograph stood on the bedside table. Zhang Xiao picked up the frame and gently wiped away dust that wasn't there.
Looking at his daughter's gap-toothed grin, Zhang Xiao felt another fierce ache in his chest.
A large part of the reason he had thrown himself in front of that child back then was probably that the little girl looked so much like his daughter...
Setting the frame facedown on the cabinet, Zhang Xiao stood in the bedroom doorway, gazing with endless longing at the ordinary life he could never return to. At last, the tenderness in his eyes gave way to resolve, and he turned and left the bedroom.
Cream-colored walls, a gray fabric sofa, a natural wood coffee table, an unbearably ugly folding table... Zhang Xiao watched in silence as everything familiar around him rapidly darkened and aged, like a color photograph losing all its hues until only black and white remained.
Irregular cracks appeared one after another, turning into torrents of color that swirled around him. He reached out, and the torrents immediately seemed to sense a pull, forming a funnel-shaped vortex that rushed toward his palm and condensed into a thick book.
Zhang Xiao stroked the word "Home" on its spine, then walked into the remaining room: his study.
It was somewhat different from before. The