2 Questions Every Girl is Asking Herself

Chapter 65

The dinner with Hong Wong after the show helped refresh my spirits.

Hong Wang does everything gently, and energy settles around him like soothing spa mist. The last time I was in China, we exchanged email addresses, but never stayed in touch. And I thought that was how our relationship would remain for the rest of our lives. Then one day, nearly a year after that dinner in Beijing, I received an email from him out of the blue.

He wrote to tell me that he broke up with his girlfriend of five years and was very sad. She was the one he intended to marry. But for a multi plethora complicated set of reasons, things didn't work out. He missed her more than he thought was possible. Couldn't sleep. Couldn't even lose himself in video games. "To love only to have it come to nothing is too painful," he said. She had met someone else.

I tried to comfort him, and answered his IMs whenever he was in distress. I dug out my memories of heartbreak and ways to cope from seven years ago, little reminders that there is in fact, an end to this despair. I had just started going out with Matt at the time. Hong Wang said he was happy for me.

When he found out I'd be coming back to China to film the show, he offered to attend the live recording. He booked a room in the same hotel as mine, and helped me rehearse my lines. He was so endearingly thoughtful, he even brought me an old cell phone to use in China, with a sim card and prepaid plan all set up and ready to go.

Whenever I felt ridiculous about how I looked, what I said, or if my anxiety about everything was making me look ridiculous even to him, he reassured me with an easy smile that everything was just fine. He said being with me reminded him of what it's like to chase dreams.

FCWR's recording schedule ran from Saturday to Monday. Hong Wang was going to watch two episodes and leave Sunday afternoon, to be back for work on Monday. Sometime during the recording on Sunday I was too busy paying attention to the male contestants and trying to think of intelligent things to say, I lost track of Hong Wang in the crowd. When we finished at 8pm, after a 12 hour day, I watched the audience dissipate in the lobby, feeling a strange sense of loss. I never got the chance to say good bye.

Just then, Hong Wang tapped me on the shoulder.

"Why are you still here?" I turned around.

"I took the day off," He smiled.

We ate barbequed skewers at a nearby restaurant and walked back to the hotel. A couple of girls recognized me from behind, and in the darkness (though I can't fathom how).

"Aren't you that artsy girl from the dating show?" (Which is funny because my roommate later complained to me, 'Why does everyone call you the artsy girl? When really I'm the artsy girl? I actually went to ART school.' She makes a good point.)

Seeing Hong Wang next to me, the girls used this opportunity to get nosy, "Who is this guy? Is he a secret admirer? A male contestant?"

"He's a friend," I smiled.

"Yes, a friend," Hong Wang confirmed.

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The next day, after the last episode has been filmed, we all packed our bags and got ready to leave. I ran into Jing, a fellow contestant from Toronto, in the hotel lobby. She was going on a road trip with her mother, and offered me a lift to the train station. Hong Wang walked me to the door.

"You're leaving so soon again," he said. We faced each other. Then calmly, without any hesitation or nervousness, he said something I'd longed to hear for a very long time, "If you lived in China, I would ask you out for sure."

I smiled a sad smile. We held our gazes on each other for a moment. Then standing on tip toes, I gave him a warm hug.

"Take care of yourself," I said.

"You too," He replied.

"Elementary school friend seems nice, why don't you date him?" Jing teased when I got in the car.

"Too far away," I said.

That wasn't the truth of course.

If only Hong Wang had said this one year earlier, then ... 

Hearing him say this now sent a flood of bittersweet memories through my mind. I felt sad that we'd missed each other, but also happy that my feelings for him a year ago wasn't one sided. He had felt the same thing.

What a trick timing plays in our destinies.

Afterwards, Hong Wang wrote a post on his personal blog. He said he felt incredibly empty on the way back to Beijing, walking up the stairs to a dark apartment, all alone. He enjoyed his time in Nanjing, despite its brevity. And that I looked refreshingly pretty without makeup.

In many ways, I was glad he had come. I was also glad for him that he had come. Pain from heartbreak is as unyielding as the wind; we're so helpless in the face of it. It's like a window that opens of its own accord, the room grows cold, and we can do nothing but shiver. But when we leave the room, travel on unfamiliar paths, look at unfamiliar scenery, one day we will find the things we're trying hard to forget are already gone.