Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction 2020complete | Page 545

“What are you doing here? You aren’t meant to be here Ka Ming!” she spoke exasperatedly, taking a few
steps back nearing the close road.
“I’ve been looking for you for so long - please tell me everything that happened. I need to know, even if
you might just leave again. I’m here because I missed you so much all this time that you left.” I shouted at
her - just hoping she would explain things once and for all.
“I-I don’t know what to say.” she stuttered back in return.
She composed herself before stammering out loud, “I really did miss you too. It was absolutely terrible being
without you. I know this may be hard to believe but, I didn’t have any other choice. I had to leave Iao
Hon. My family - they forced me out because they didn’t want me to be with you! I begged and pleaded
but, they forced me to distance myself from you. I’m so sorry for leaving you all alone, I’m so, so sorry.
Please, I regret what I had to do, my family is what has stopped me from wanting to be with you all this
time!”.
“It’s okay, none of that matters now Siu Mei, I trust you, and I trust that you didn’t want to leave.” I
reassured her, “We don’t have to worry about your family, all that matters is that we have each other and
make each other happy right? Siu Mei, I don’t know how to express this but, I love you, Siu Mei, I love
you. I want you to run away with me back to where we had all our fun times together - we don’t need to
think about what anything else.”
“You don’t need to ask Ka Ming. I made up my choice a long time ago - I no longer want to be confined
by my family anymore. I want to be free and I want to be happy for what I want, not my family.” Siu Mei
declared, “I love you, Ka Ming, I really do love you. So, let’s run away together and start a new life away
from here.”
I look into Siu Mei’s eyes before taking her hand onto the pavement by the road, “Shall we?”
She smiled at me before gripping my hand and saying, “We shall.”
“And that’s the story of how we ended up here you two.” I concluded, taking a good long breath, grabbing
a sip of water on the cool balcony.
Just as I was expecting a reply from my grandchildren, I saw that both of them were already sound asleep.
Here, in this large intra-connected megacity, the best parts of mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau are
all mixed, and here, is where I hope that children just like my grandchildren can make their fondest
memories. Thanks to the strong sense of community that has been fostered by connecting all these places
together, I can’t wait for all the wonderful things that will happen to my grandchildren as well. Just by
looking at them sleeping, it gives me enough reassurance that the youth will be going into this world into an
even better place than before, where they will be growing up in with even more things to experience than I
ever did.
As I reminisce about my past times that have long passed, I hope for the joyful times that have yet to come
for my grandchildren.
Now, it’s time for them to make their own special and intimate memories in this place called, “The Greater
Bay Area”.