211 Conjured her up!

"Umm… are you alright?" Hui's concerned voice reached her ears.

Standing there with two glasses of chilled Rosé wine, he had a worried expression on his face. Not managing to catch the attention of the busy servers, he had personally gone to the bar to get the drinks for both of them. When he came back, he saw her covering her face with her hands. Was she crying again?

"Yes, yes… I just felt, uh, dizzy for a moment. But I am fine now," she tried to cover up.

"I was wondering if it would be alright that I excused myself now. It has been a long day today and I find myself extremely tired," she continued speaking before he could respond to it.

Hui put the glasses down immediately and said contritely, "of course. I am sorry. I should have not agreed to this plan of Eric's. You have barely recovered."

Jia Li felt guilty because of using her health as an excuse but she really didn't want to stay put at the place any longer.

"I will quickly settle the bill and we shall leave," he said immediately.

"Nooo, there is no need for that. I shall take the tube. My flat is really close by. It would take you way longer to go around the area and drop me. I will see you at work tomorrow. Please say bye to Eric for me. Thank you and g'night," she blabbered and hurried away before Hui could even form an appropriate reply to stop her.

She sat in the nearly empty train, head leaning against the window. Was her behaviour this evening a reflection of her suppressed emotions, her escapist attitude? Was she a coward as well, running away from herself? Why couldn't she simply enjoy what had been a good evening? It was as if every time she let her guard down, the feelings which she thought she had exorcised long ago, came to the surface again. She got down at her station and walked towards the exit, lost in her muddled thoughts.

"Jia… Lin Jia Li? Is that you?" he stood in front of her, shock visible on his face.

She froze, looking at the familiar face of her dear friend.

"You… you are in London. You are here. All this while, have you been living in London? " Wei still couldn't believe it and uttered the first incoherent words which came to his mind.

Some inner voice of Jia Li mocked her for asking that question to self a little while ago – am I a coward? It seemed that God had sent her the answer in form of a living example of that. She had run away in the middle of the night from Wei's house, leaving nothing but an apology letter. After all that he had done for her, the least that she had owed him was an explanation in person. But she had instinctively chosen the path of least resistance. The only person who had seen her was Mrs. Wang that night. Clutching her bag in her hand, Jia Li had descended the stairs of the Wang house in wee hours of the morning and run straight into Wei's mother.

She had thought that she would have to offer an explanation but the older woman had simply said, "thank you. Please ensure that you never come back."

Recalling that, she didn't know how to react right now. Standing in front of him, her eyes felt heavy with guilt and remorse. She was unable to look into his excited ones.

Wei had been in a good mood post his father's successful surgery and had decided to step out to grab a celebratory meal while his mother kept him company at the hospital.

"I am going to start looking for Jia Li the minute I reach Shanghai," he vowed to himself during a solo meal at one of the eateries in Covent Garden.

The place had been full of colour, music and he had thought that Jia Li would have liked this dinner place. He couldn't find a cab to go back to the hospital and ended up at the tube station. And there she was, climbing up the stairs towards exit. It was as if he had conjured her up from his thoughts.

She looked like a vision in an off-white dress, her hair all mussed up, the colour of her cheeks high. Wei couldn't believe his eyes as she kept coming towards him, her usual expression of being lost in her own thoughts. Before he knew it, she had reached right next to him, without looking up even once. He called out her name…

"Hi Wei… this, this is a surprise. Yes, I am living here in London, currently," her voice faltered.

She didn't know what to say. He couldn't hold back for even a nanosecond anymore and closed the distance between them.