Without Me

Sitting on a wooden, cold bench, Yao Xi felt as though her soul had escaped from her body, leaving behind only an empty shell.

She returned to the times before she met Li Ye Han. Until the times when she was alone, not knowing the feeling of attachment. When she thought of herself as a meaningless woman whose death no one would notice.

She would be invisible again.

Not that marriage was better for seven years. Contrary. Nothing changed. Except her heart.

Even though she was a formal wife, she didn't have anyone to rely on.

A man called her husband, acted as if she were another accidental person, whom he had the misfortune to meet.

She felt like one of his business partners. The one who is forgotten after signing the contract and never meets again. Until the contract expires.

Then you either renew the contract or end all.

That was today.

Yao Xi's mind was in chaos and her eyes were blank when she listened to, how a man in a gown announces that she is no longer married.

Just that. After seven years. She is a divorcee.

She should be happy. She should find positive in this situation, right?

First of all: she was still alive. Which, in total, was not necessarily the best consolation, but still.

If she had not married Li's family, she would have been dead in an unmarked grave seven years ago. Or maybe it would end worse? Knowing these people, they would not even dig a hole. They could throw her body somewhere into the forest to devour the wild animals.

So, she should be grateful.

Second: She was free. Although she had no idea what to do with this regained freedom. She should be happy.

She should be...

But how she should be happy, when the only person in the world, who set a new direction in her colorless life, left her?

Ever since she met him, he became something like a deity in her eyes. Someone who unintentionally saved her from a life, in which she was considered to be someone worse than a dog.

He showed her the world where she felt important, needed.

Being a good wife, became her only goal in life. A goal that she never had before. Until she met Li Ye Han, she didn't even know that she might want to have a goal sometime. But that's exactly what happened.

She discovered that she wanted to be someone who would make this indifferent, cold and overbearing man happy. Even if only a little.

She treated it as her life mission, which she clung to. Yao Xi believed that in this way she would repay this man for pulling her out of the abyss, in which she had been kept for most of her life.

How could she have expected that she would fall in love with him along the way ?!

For someone who had spent her whole life in the abyss, not knowing the family warmth, love from relatives, or even compassion, in the moment when he appeared before her eyes, he became her anchor.

A lifebuoy that kept it afloat, preventing it from drowning.

Like a newborn pet, who consider his mother, the first person that he sees after birth.

She felt so.

The moment she saw him, she was born again.

Her eyes went to Li Ye Han, sitting on the opposite side of the courtroom, accompanied by his lawyer.

The attorney whispered something to his ear, but Yi Ye Han didn't pay attention to him. He stared at his phone as if he couldn't wait to finally get out and take on something more important.

- Ms. Li.

Yao Xi almost jumped at the sound of her new - old name.

What was the point of calling her that name, if in a few minutes she will not be Ms. Li anymore?

She turned to the judge. His expression made her understand that he was a bit nervous that she did not listen to him.

She straightened up and focused her attention on him.

"Do you agree to the settlement conditions proposed by Mr Li?" Judge repeatedly irritated.

Yao Xi wondered for a second what the judge said and about what conditions he speaks. She didn't listen to him at all.

Although she did not have her attorney, her husband's lawyer sent her some doc.u.ments before the trial, but she did not want to look at them. She immediately threw them into the trash without even looking at them. Was that it? It's possible, but who cares.

"No." She answered, ignoring her husband's sharp gaze directed at her, like daggers. She simply continued: "I don't want anything."

The courtroom fell silent for a second.

The divorce of the largest construction tycoon in the country, and the most desirable man, caused a sensation on a national scale.

All media gathered to be witnesses of how the heir of the most powerful family becomes a single again. Some stations record live broadcasts, so that all the women in front of the TVs could fall in happiness, seeing with their own eyes, how the object of their sighs is free again.

But nobody expected that this little woman would not want any divorce compensation.

When the world went round saying that the young master of the Li family was divorcing, everyone was shocked. For several weeks the main topic in the media and the internet was: when Mr. Li got married, and the other, who was the lucky who could entrap such a powerful man?

There have been many speculations and rumors. Some said that since she managed to grab such a man, the only reasonable explanation was that she had to come from some influential family, comparable to Li.

Other rumors said she was a tricky woman who must have had a hook and would have blackmailed Li Ye Han so he had to marry her.

She gained the opinion of a gold sucker who preyed on him.

And now the woman who, rumor has been soaked with greed for bone marrow, easily withdrew all the reparation that Li Ye Han offered ?!

Impossible!

Yao Li ignored the whispers that were rising louder in the hall. She turned around and looked seriously at her ex-husband: "I. Don't. Want. Anything. From. You." She spelled louder and clearer.

Now no one had any doubts, if they heard wrong.

But Li Ye Han looked at her only dubiously. He couldn't believe that a woman like her didn't make any demands.

Li Ye Han honestly doubted her unselfishness. He wondered what she up to. According to him, it was just a game on her part. Although he couldn't understand what she could gain from it.

He frowned, trying to figure out what she might be up to, when she turned back to the judge. "Your honor, I don't need anything from my ex-husband. I agree to divorce by agreement, so please finish it quickly."

How could there be a woman, who would ask a judge to hurry up and announce a divorce with her husband?

Especially if her husband was Li Ye Han himself!