Sixty Seconds for Lifetime
True love resides in the heart. Only when your lover’s name is etched in your heart will you spend your life giving everything to them, showing your love, and continuing your love.
The man and woman had just finished dinner. The man was about to catch a flight to a distant city for a business trip. Planes don’t wait for anyone. Despite that, their dinner was elaborate and abundant, not hurried at all. Everything on the table was the man’s favorite, prepared by the woman, who had spent most of the afternoon making a rich seafood feast. The man, like a shark, loved seafood, but his demeanor was nothing like one—he was elegant, articulate, and a distinguished man.
The man boarded the plane in the early evening. He told the woman, “By the time I get off the plane, it will be quite late, so I won’t call you tonight. I’ll call you tomorrow morning.”
The woman responded, “Okay.” She waved at him from the window as he left. Over the next half month, the man would be in a foreign city.
It was late, and the woman had already fallen sound asleep. Suddenly, the phone rang, waking her. She glanced at the clock by the bed—it was past 1 a.m. She got up, went to the living room, and picked up the phone. She heard a familiar male voice.
The man asked, “How are you?” quite abruptly.
The woman was surprised. “I’m fine. I was asleep. Weren’t you going to call in the morning?”
The man seemed worried and asked again, “Are you sure? Do you feel unwell at all?”
The woman chuckled a bit, finding his concern amusing. “Of course I’m fine. I was sleeping soundly. What’s going on with you?”
The man said, “Just wanted to let you know I’ve arrived. Don’t worry. If anything happens, don’t forget to call.” Then he wished her goodnight and quickly hung up.
The woman stood there holding the phone for nearly a minute, puzzled. Something seemed off with the man tonight, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on what.
Half a month later, the man returned as scheduled, still looking vibrant. But now, there was a scar on his abdomen. The woman asked, “What happened?”
He replied, “It’s nothing, just a small injury.”
The woman got worried and pressed him for more details.
The man smiled and said, “I’ll tell you, but don’t get mad. That night, after I got off the plane, I was walking down the street when I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my stomach. It was excruciating, something I’d never felt before, and it almost made me pass out. Immediately, I thought of the seafood we had, thinking it might be food poisoning. You know, in our seaside town, every year, some people die from eating seafood. So, I called you, thinking that if it was food poisoning, you might feel something too. If you didn’t answer the phone, or if you answered but felt unwell, I would have immediately called 911 to get help to you. But hearing your voice and realizing you were fine, I felt reassured and hung up.”
The woman, now concerned, asked, “You were in so much pain, yet you still had the time to worry about me first? Why didn’t you get help immediately?”
The man gazed at her lovingly and said, “No matter how urgent, I had to call you first. You know, with food poisoning, there’s no room for carelessness. Time is life.”
The woman suddenly recalled that night—the phone had rung persistently for a long time before she lazily got up to answer. Even though they only exchanged a few brief words, those few words took a full minute. Which meant, during that minute, the man was enduring unbearable pain. Only after confirming that the woman was fine did he rule out food poisoning and then seek help from a passerby or call the local emergency services. If she had been poisoned, even though he was thousands of kilometers away, the man would have made sure medical help reached her. He would have lost about 60 seconds, a minute in which he had unhesitatingly given to the woman.
And those 60 seconds, the man surely knew, could have been the difference between life and death. The woman couldn’t say anything; she was at a loss for words. The man smiled lightly and said, “It’s fine. It was just a scare, and nothing terrible happened.” He pointed to the scar on his belly and playfully winked. “This is the souvenir left by my acute appendicitis.”
The woman couldn’t laugh, her eyes had already filled with tears. She hugged him tightly and said, “Those 60 seconds are the reason I’ll spend my life with you.”
Thank you for reading! ” Sitestorys “
