Rory Linden checked the license plate number again, confirming it really was Sean Harrison’s car.
She bought so joss paper and a lighter from a small shop at the entrance.
Once she had her things, she hurried into the cetery.
Rory Linden had walked the path to her mother’s gravestone many tis before.
Each ti, she had been in a different state of mind.
But this ti, she was a little nervous.
It was impossible that a relative of the Harrington Family would be buried in an ordinary cetery like this. If Sean Harrison was here, it could only be to see her mother.
’He...’
’Why did he co here?’
Rory Linden couldn’t help but quicken her pace.
Her mother’s gravesite was in a corner of the cetery.
As Rory Linden walked along the long path, she saw Sean Harrison standing at its end in the distance.
He had his head lowered, looking at the gravestone before him and seemingly murmuring sothing.
His expression was solemn, his deanor humble.
"Sean Harrison."
Rory Linden hurried over.
A bouquet of fresh, vibrant flowers lay before the gravestone, clearly brought by him just monts ago.
He looked a little surprised to see her. "What are you doing here?"
Rory Linden countered, "I should be the one asking you that. Why are you here?"
This was her mother’s grave.
They were a couple, but that was as far as it went.
They hadn’t reached this stage yet.
"I don’t know the details of what happened back then, but I believe you. I suspect my father may have done sothing terrible, and I wanted to co apologize to your mother on his behalf."
Sean Harrison lowered his gaze, his eyes resting on the black-and-white photograph on the gravestone.
Rory Linden didn’t know when the photograph of her mother had been taken.
But she now bore a striking resemblance to the woman in the picture, especially in the eyes.
Her mother was just thinner, almost gaunt, with no flesh on her cheeks.
"This has nothing to do with you. You aren’t the one who needs to apologize."
Rory Linden placed the joss paper she had just bought inside the small, brick-lined compartnt in front of the gravestone.
She lit the paper with her lighter.
As the joss paper slowly burned, smoke curled into the air, and the wind carried the ashes away.
As she burned the paper, Rory Linden told her mother that she would be going to the countryside for a dical outreach program and wouldn’t be able to visit and burn offerings in October.
She then brought up Gary Sinclair.
"If Gary Sinclair is having a hard ti, he brought it on himself. I won’t give him a single penny for living expenses, much less support him."
After a mont’s thought, she stood up and went to stand beside Sean Harrison.
"Mom, let make an introduction. This is Sean Harrison, Miles Harrison’s uncle. I’m not sure if you ever t him." Rory Linden glanced at the man beside her and added earnestly, "It’s all thanks to his help. I probably couldn’t have resolved the issue with Gary Sinclair by myself."
A second of silence hung in the air.
Then Sean Harrison asked, "Aren’t you going to tell your mom who I am?"
"Huh?" A mischievous glint appeared in Rory Linden’s eyes. "I just did. You’re Miles Harrison’s uncle."
Sean Harrison looked at her. "And?"
Seeing the smile on his lips fade, Rory Linden reached out and looped her arm through his. "Mom, Sean Harrison is my boyfriend now. We haven’t been together long, but he’s very good to ."
Rory Linden wasn’t sure how long she and Sean Harrison would last.
’But it doesn’t matter.’
’If Mom were still alive, I would have told her the day our relationship beca official.’
Even though her mother had died when she was very young, Rory rembered her as a wonderful person.
She was sure her mother would support whatever decision she made.
Sean Harrison finally spoke. "I will always be very good to you. And in the future, I’ll be your husband."
"Don’t make promises you can’t keep in front of my mom," Rory teased. "If it doesn’t co true, she’ll co find you in your dreams."
She said it jokingly.
But deep down, she truly didn’t think she and Sean Harrison would end up together.
In the short ti they had been living together, she had co to realize she didn’t really know Sean Harrison at all.
The look on his face and his actions while he was dreaming not long ago, for example.
That hadn’t seed like a coincidence.
-
The next day was Monday, the first workday of September.
There was an elentary school near their apartnt. It was the first day of school, so the streets were lined with cars dropping off children, causing a brief traffic jam.
By the ti Rory Linden reached the hospital, she was almost late.
When she reached the entrance to the Inpatient Departnt, she saw a group of people standing in the lobby.
Director Quinn from dical Affairs was at the front. Among the doctors and nurses behind him, the most noticeable person was the towering Evan Hollis.
Rory Linden was rushing toward the elevators...
"Rory Linden, co here." Director Quinn called out to her. "Perfect, we’re one person short. Are you busy this morning? Any surgeries?"
Rory Linden glanced at Evan Hollis before asking, "Director Quinn, where are all of you going?"
"We’re heading to a few kindergartens to give the children check-ups. Our team was complete, but Dr. Li from Internal dicine ca down with a fever and can’t make it. You co with us."
"Ch-children?"
Rory Linden was not good at handling children.
Before she could refuse, Director Quinn had already pulled out his phone and was dialing Keith Hawthorne.
He gave Rory Linden no chance to object.
The minibus that would take them to the kindergartens was parked right at the hospital entrance.
After they got on, Evan Hollis took the seat next to Rory Linden and said with a broad smile, "Dr. Linden, looks like we’re on the sa team again."
Rory Linden managed a weak smile. "If I had a choice, I’d rather be back at my post."
"Don’t you like kids, Dr. Linden?" Evan Hollis asked.
"It’s not that." Rory Linden sighed. "I like kids, I’m just not very good at dealing with them. The mont they start crying and throwing a tantrum, I’m completely at a loss..."
It was likely due to her upbringing.
She had always been a well-behaved child and rarely spent ti around other children.
Evan Hollis bead. "Then I’ll team up with you! I’ve been a ’king of the kids’ since I was little. I’m an expert at handling them!"
"Oh, really?"
Rory Linden asked offhandedly.
Still, she believed him.
Evan Hollis was like a little sun, radiating warmth everywhere he went. He really did have the aura of a ’king of the kids’.
Evan, however, thought she was skeptical and lowered his voice to say, "It’s because I grew up without parents, in an orphanage overseas. I’m Asian, but I have curly hair, so no one wanted to adopt . I stayed in that orphanage for a very long ti. I guarantee you, no one in this hospital is better at handling kids than I am."
Rory Linden was completely taken aback.
Evan Hollis had studied dicine overseas, where tuition is incredibly expensive.
She would never have guessed he was an orphan.
Rory Linden opened her mouth, but the words she was about to say caught in her throat. All she could manage was, "I’m sorry..."
She hadn’t ant to touch a raw nerve.
The minibus drove on for a bit.
Evan Hollis continued in a low voice, "Actually, there was a woman who wanted to adopt back then. She was from Celestria, too. She wanted to adopt because I did well in school and was very smart."
Rory Linden turned to look at him, unsure what to say for a mont.
’The way he’s talking... ’
’She must not have adopted him in the end.’
"I was already ten by then, an age where kids almost never get adopted, so I studied even harder. I also learned to draw and play the guitar to make sure that every ti the woman ca to see , I had made huge, surprising improvents."
As Evan spoke, his mood seed to sink.
He sighed. "Later, I found out that woman already had a son."
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