“You gotta move forward,” Liu pressed. “You can’t keep trying to live as if she were here. You need to accept that.”

“That’s hard to accept from you at the moment,” Lucas said. Considering you’re still wearing her face.

“You’ve been drinking her favorite wines, eating her favorite cheeses, living in that apartment of yours just because of its sentimental value, and even playing this stupid game she always talked about. You can’t keep doing this to yourself.”

“The last two years of in-game time have shown me that, yeah, I can,” Lucas argued. “It’s not the worst life.”

“But it’s not one where you’re happy,” she quickly snapped back. Lucas wasn’t sure when it had happened, but she had managed to drink the entire bottle of beer at some point in their conversation, even though he didn’t remember her chugging it. “You’re miserable, beating yourself up at every turn, and even now that you’ve finally found something you enjoy doing, you’re still stabbing yourself in the heart over the fact you enjoy it.”

Lucas just frowned. She wasn’t wrong, but he didn’t really want to hear it.

“Look,” Liu said, taking another beer and then a long drink from it. “I’m trying to tell you she’s dead, not you. But when she was alive, all sis ever talked about was you and how she wanted you to be happy. She wanted you to be happy more than she wanted to be happy. I know this is a fact because of those stupid freaking cosplay outfits she wore for you even though she’d complain the next day about how uncomfortable and awkward they were to wear. Do you think that changed?” Liu asked, giving him a moment to answer as she stared him straight in the eyes. When he didn’t reply, she just kept on talking. “‘Cause I don’t think it ever would. I guarantee that, if there is a heaven, she ain’t sitting around hoping you’re miserable for her. She’d be up there praying you’d find someone else and move on with your life, that you’d find happiness again. I promise you this.”

Lucas tried to swallow, but it hurt. He could feel his eyes reddening and his cheeks heating up as he thought about Yu Hua and how much he missed her, but Liu was right, as much as he hated admitting it. He knew that the woman he loved would always poke and prod at him every single time he frowned, never letting him have a single moment of peace until he was cheered up and smiling ear to ear. “Yeah . . . she really was like that.”

“So, are you gonna keep beating yourself up, even knowing it’s the last thing she’d want?” Liu asked.

“Are you?” Lucas countered.