Mike rode back to the small town lost in thought. The night was heavy, streetlights casting thin shadows across the empty roads. The wind howled outside the car window, as if urging him to confront the confusion in his chest. In the months away from home, he had never felt so adrift. One thought echoed again and again:

“Does love truly exist? Have I been living on Mars all this time? Why does my understanding of the world differ so much from the reality before my eyes?”

His upbringing had painted a world woven with love: people should care for and support one another.

He remembered his father secretly slipping money into his pocket before each semester, telling him not to be stingy. His mother would hand him a bulging bag of snacks, urging him to take care on the road. She always reminded him, “If you don’t like someone, tell her early. Don’t break a girl’s heart.” Staying out overnight was forbidden—his father would scold him for being “irresponsible” and ground him.

Even now, he barely knew how to choose his own clothes; such things had always been handled first by his mother, then by his wife. He remembered his mother’s sleepless nights when his father was ill, his father’s silent endurance when she complained. On the day his father died, his mother didn’t shed a single tear but refused food and water for three days, falling gravely ill herself. On her deathbed, she had only one wish: to be buried beside him.

Yet even this deep devotion carried cracks. He recalled his mother’s sighs, his father’s silence. Every marriage bears scars. Everyone wears masks.

“Why can’t people live just once without pretense?” he thought bitterly. At that moment, Mike felt like the child in The Emperor’s New Clothes, exposing the hypocrisy of the adult world. Beneath the glittering masks lay only emptiness and loneliness.

With a sigh, he pushed open the bar door.

The bar’s drumbeats and clamor struck him like a wave. Colored lights spun overhead, scattering fragments of light across the smoky air. The bartender shook a silver shaker, laughing with customers. On the dance floor, young bodies swayed, sweat and laughter mixing with shrieks of delight.

Mike spotted Randy slumped at the bar, clutching a half-empty bottle of whiskey, staring toward the entrance. When he saw Mike, he staggered up and waved frantically.

Mike hurried over, steered him to a quieter corner, and ordered a fresh bottle with two glasses. Pouring, he teased lightly:

“I’m gone a few days and you’re already like this? Skipping Fonda to drink alone?”

“Fuck Fonda!” Randy slammed the bottle down and gulped deeply. He coughed, eyes bloodshot. “That woman’s a damn juicer! These nights, she’s been on me non-stop—two, three times a night. By the end, it wasn’t pleasure, it was pain. Look at me now—I can’t even stand straight!”

Mike frowned. “Did she… take something?”

“She’s always like this,” Randy muttered, tugging open his shirt to reveal purple-red love bites across his chest. “Says she wants to make me never forget her.”

Mike sighed. “Sounds like she cares.”

“Bullshit.” Randy sneered, but his eyes dimmed. He lit a cigarette, inhaling deeply before speaking. “Everyone thinks I’m a player. But the only woman I truly loved was Fonda.”

Mike blinked. “What do you mean?”

Randy’s voice grew low. “My wife… she was the prettiest girl in our class. I chased her, but she rejected me. Two years ago she suddenly came back, said she liked me. I lost my head—and married her.”

He exhaled smoke slowly. “Later I heard she used to chase rich kids in college, partying like crazy. People said at one party… she even slept with three guys at once. When they got bored of her, she turned to me—the backup plan.”

Mike held his breath. “And you—?”

“By the time I knew, she was six months pregnant.” Randy gave a bitter smile. “I said nothing. The day the baby was born, I rushed for a paternity test. It was mine.” He drained his glass, knuckles whitening. “If it wasn’t, I could’ve divorced her, claimed damages. But it was mine. I had no choice but to swallow it.”

Mike’s voice was soft. “Why not just come clean?”

“She’s too shrewd. She’d deny everything, then accuse me of slander. The whole town would know. My parents’ faces—where would they hide them?”

Mike fell silent. Finally, he asked, “Then why hold on to Fonda?”

Randy’s gaze softened, his drunkenness tinged with sincerity. “Because she’s real. She doesn’t lie, doesn’t chase money, doesn’t chain me down. She accepts everything about me—even my games. Her only rule is: when you’re with her, you’re only with her. That one rule alone makes her more genuine than most women.”

Mike nodded slowly. “That is rare.”

Randy raised his glass with a bitter smile. “Brother, remember this: be good to yourself. Don’t live in chains. Everything else… is just a mirage.”

They drank in silence. The dance floor thundered with noise, but between them stretched only alcohol and emptiness. Lights flickered in their glasses like phantom dreams. Mike looked at Randy and felt a chill of irony—perhaps what we call reality is nothing more than another mirage.