Chapter 262: You never knew...but I did...

Chapter 310 – The Shatter

The nurses stood in the doorway, frozen.

Not one of them dared to breathe too loudly.

They had never seen Fu Jing Rong like this.

For an entire month, the man had carried himself like a fortress—silent, firm, unmoving. Even when he came daily, sat beside the sleeping woman without uttering a word, they could feel the emotion in his stillness. They didn’t know who she was—no one had told them. Her name wasn’t on any official file. But they had all seen the way he watched her. The way he adjusted her blanket. The way he lingered just a little longer after the nightly checks.

That care, quiet and constant, had spoken volumes.

But now?

Now, they were watching the unbreakable fall apart.

Fu Jing Rong had sunk to the ground beside the empty bed. His tall frame hunched over, arms limp at his sides, and his head bowed so low his forehead nearly touched the floor. His back shook. Barely. But enough for everyone behind him to notice.

One nurse—middle-aged, calm, the one who’d administered the IVs most often—stepped forward instinctively, her hand rising to comfort him.

But halfway there, she froze.

There was something sacred about this moment. Something raw.

She couldn’t intrude.

She lowered her hand and stepped back.

The others followed her lead.

No one spoke.

They didn’t need to.

Inside the room, the silence was deafening.

Fu Jing Rong didn’t make a sound. Not a cry. Not a word.

But his body told the story. His shoulders trembling with a grief too heavy. His hands digging into the floor, grasping for something—anything—that would bring her back. His breathing, shallow and uneven, like every inhale was a battle.

How?

How had she disappeared?

He had protected her.

He had made sure of it.

He had poured every bit of what he had left into creating this sanctuary, this quiet corner of the world where she could rest without fear. And now—it was empty.

He had failed.

Again.

No amount of logic could slow the storm inside his chest. No amount of reason could convince him that maybe she had woken up and simply walked away.

No.

His mind raced with the worst.

Had someone come?

Had she fallen?

Had he made a mistake again?

His fists clenched, jaw tight, as he gritted his teeth to keep the scream inside. But it didn’t work. A sound escaped—hoarse, low, strangled—and it shattered whatever pieces of pride were still holding him together.

And then—he stopped moving.

He sat still.

Completely.

The kind of stillness that only came when a man had run out of tears before they even arrived.

Behind him, the nurses still stood. Watching. Quiet. Respectful. The older one wiped her eyes without a word.

Because in that moment, none of them were strangers anymore.

They were witnesses to something sacred and broken.

Fu Jing Rong didn’t care who saw.

He had lost her.

And this time, the silence she left behind was unbearable.

...

Fu Jing Rong stood in the middle of the room that had once carried life.

Now, it was too still. Too clean. Too painfully empty.

The scent of orchids clung to the sheets. Marigolds sat fresh in the vase by the bedside, their petals still damp from the morning’s mist. But the woman—his woman—was not there.

He blinked, but the scene didn’t change.

She was gone.

Behind him, nurses hovered, silent and tense. They were all professionals—handpicked, trained, loyal. But not one of them dared speak. Not when the man they had worked beside for a month—the one who never cracked, who gave curt nods instead of grief—was now on his knees, unmoving.

They had never seen him like this.

They had never seen anyone like this.

One of the nurses, the oldest of them all, stepped forward. Her lips parted, but the moment her foot shifted on the tile and made a small noise, she froze. His shoulders were shaking. Not with anger. Not with rage.

With sorrow.

Fu Jing Rong’s head dipped lower as the silence in the room pressed against him like a vice.

He had been too late. Again.

He clenched his fists. Hard. Until he felt the skin stretch. Until his vision blurred completely. Large beads of tears fell without sound, soaking into the hem of his coat and onto the polished floor beneath him.

He did not hear them fall.

He did not realize he was crying until the nurse beside him moved quietly away and he saw the reflection of his broken self in the glass cabinet.

Still, he didn’t wipe the tears.

They weren’t something he could hide.

He didn’t know how long he stayed there. But when he stood, the room felt colder. His chest felt hollow.

Everyone had vanished—giving him space, or perhaps afraid to face him in this state.

So he walked.

Out of the quiet room, past the empty hallway, past the open doors that let the breeze in. And he stepped out into the garden.

Yellow Garden.

His home. His fortress. His punishment.

The scent of blossoms struck him like a slap.

Stretching in front of him was a sea of pale gold. Rows and rows of canariums, tall and graceful, bending ever so slightly in the soft wind. Their yellow blooms shimmered against the emerald stems, painting the entire garden in warmth.

He had planted them long before the accident.

Long before the coma.

Long before he’d even understood what he felt.

Back then, they were enemies. Bitter ones. Always crossing paths in ways that left sparks and bruises.

And yet, he remembered that night.

An award show. She had won—Best Actress, standing radiant beneath the stage lights, brushing her hair behind her ear with that little tilt of the chin she always did when she was proud but pretending not to be.

He hadn’t clapped. But he’d watched.

Backstage, as he passed her changing room, he had seen the bouquets spilling over every surface. Red roses. White lilies. Orchids. Peonies. But she’d reached for a single yellow bloom among them—a lone thing, almost hidden.

She had laughed. "My favorite."

He had stopped in his tracks.

He never said anything.

He just left that building, drove back to this very house, and ordered the garden to be cleared. Then, in the middle of the night, when he couldn’t sleep—when the anger and confusion and whatever else this feeling was clawed at his chest—he planted the first bulb himself.

He told no one.

He watered them quietly.

He watched them grow.

All for what?

A dream. A foolish, delusional hope that someday, if they ever stopped fighting... if the stars aligned... they could walk through these yellow flowers together. Hand in hand. In love. In peace.

But now—she was gone.

The flowers swayed gently, like they were mocking him. Or mourning with him.

He took a slow breath, his eyes stinging again.

"I planted these for you," he whispered. "You never knew. But I did."