As if her efforts had finally moved heaven, this semester’s final exam saw Qi Qi rank first in her class and third in the grade.
She finally found the courage to stand beside that person. On the first day of winter break, she called Huan’er, “Are you all studying together? I don’t have tutoring this break, can I come to join you?”
“Come quick, come quick!” Huan’er had finally received a proactive greeting from her friend and was so excited she wanted to go pick her up directly. She chattered on, “We’re all at Song Cong’s place. He and Liao Xinyan are helping Jing Qichi with biology. Jing Qichi’s improved this time, he’s out of the bottom ranks.”
“Who is it?” Song Cong asked.
“Qi.”
On the other end of the phone, Qi Qi listened intently, wondering how he would respond to her name. Would he invite her? Would he ask what she’d been doing lately? Or… or perhaps knowing her liberal arts class grades, would he offer congratulations?
But there was nothing. She only heard Liao Xinyan’s voice, “No, look at evolution theory again.”
Qi Qi’s heart sank, and she asked, “Why is the monitor there too?”
Huan’er naturally couldn’t say it was because Liao Xinyan wanted to see Jing Qichi, so she could only dodge the question, “The difficulty’s too high, worried Song Cong couldn’t handle tutoring alone.”
Jing Qichi’s voice: “Who are you saying is too difficult?”
Liao Xinyan and Song Cong both called out, “Study, study!”
Huan’er shouted, “I’m on the phone, keep it down!”
How lively it was.
But every word stabbed at Qi Qi’s heart, even the most irrelevant word “biology.”
She didn’t even have biology class anymore.
On the table was fruit her mother had just brought in – among a plate of bright red apples, a yellow pear stood out awkwardly. Qi Qi picked up the innocent pear and threw it in the trash, telling the other end, “A classmate just messaged me about meeting up next time.”
This was the fate of being abandoned.
Because no matter what, she couldn’t fit in, and even trying seemed pathetically desperate.
She neither wanted to nor would become someone begging for scraps of attention.
Before Huan’er could respond, Qi Qi hung up.
“Next time” was a polite rejection, and throughout the entire winter break, Huan’er never saw Qi Qi.
She called and sent messages, but conversations always ended hurriedly after just a few words. Must be very busy, she thought – not everyone could be as free as Song Cong, especially being ranked first.
Chinese New Year was spent at the hospital. Her father hadn’t returned, and she couldn’t bear to leave her mother alone, so she didn’t go back to Sishui. Working the night shift on New Year’s Eve wasn’t anything new. The Third Hospital had better conditions – the master chef had prepared and frozen dumplings in advance, and there were induction cookers and disposable utensils on tables at the cafeteria entrance for self-service. That day’s New Year’s Eve dinner became a revolving feast, with groups coming and going, barely quiet before the next wave arrived. Huan’er and her mother joined several uncles and aunts from obstetrics for dinner – if you’re a doctor’s family member, you’d know they not only hum Beyond songs during surgery and chat about their troublesome kids, not only discuss bizarre cases they encountered that day while eating pig brain and spicy intestines, but they would also seriously divide into theoretical and empirical camps on New Year’s Eve to place bets – with night shifts as stakes, betting whether the patient in bed eight would give birth before or after midnight.
Mom Chen rubbed her daughter’s head and earnestly advised, “Obstetrics and gynecology are one unit, pay attention, it’ll be useful later.”
Huan’er answered in her heart, yes yes, I’ll use it when I have children.
After dinner, while aimlessly surfing the internet in the medical office, she received a message from Jing Qichi: “Come to the base.”
Going out the hospital’s side door and through a small garden led to the staff quarters. This area that parents had to pass through for work was what Jing Qichi called “the base.” He said when they were young, kids in the complex would plan their mischief here – great location, well-hidden, and the most dangerous place was the safest place.
Huan’er stood in the middle of the path but didn’t see anyone. Just as she took out her phone to send a message, she heard movement behind her. She quickly thrust her elbow back, then grabbed the person’s upper arm preparing for a back throw. Jing Qichi patted her crying “Ah, ah!” “It hurts, it hurts!”
Song Cong emerged from the side, laughing as he separated the two childish ones, “Told you not to test her, you were asking for it.”
Jing Qichi rubbed his right rib with a wronged expression, “Quick, get your dad to check me, I think it’s broken.”
“Not broken, I knew it was you so I didn’t use full strength,” Huan’er made a face at him.
“This… isn’t full strength? Chen Huan’er come here, I’ll show you what not using full strength means, come here, come.”
Huan’er started running around the garden with Jing Qichi chasing behind, while Song Cong stood in place almost crying with laughter.
After running for a while, Huan’er suddenly realized – why am I running when I can beat him? She stopped and said, “One-on-one.”
Jing Qichi pouted and poked her forehead, “In a bit, I’ll have you crying and begging big brother for mercy.”
They had come to comfort her with gifts, and the gift was a case of beer.
Song Cong opened a can and held it out to Huan’er, but Jing Qichi blocked it, “No manners, call me brother first.”
Huan’er nodded in agreement and said seriously, “Let me think about which department to send you to after I call you that.”
“Ophthalmology, they’re short-staffed today,” Song Cong chimed in.
“Hey Old Song, did you take a red envelope to gang up with her?”
“Enough,” Song Cong laughed and opened another can for him, “Stop showing off your limited idiom vocabulary.”
The wind was strong and the beer was cold, but drinking it made their whole bodies warm, warm enough to embrace this cold winter night.
Gratitude spread like a warm current, and Huan’er raised her beer, saying sincerely, “Thank you both.”
She knew why they came, she also knew there must have been such a deep night when they felt just like her – though they understood completely, there was still some loneliness, some hurt, some solitude.
While lights burned bright in countless homes with families reunited, some people had to stay at their posts.
Song Cong clinked cans with her, “When you want to drink in the future, find me.”
– Whether in the near or distant future, anytime, anywhere.
Jing Qichi also clinked cans, “We’re letting you drink so you can sleep well.”
– Don’t overthink it, even the hardest night will pass.
Huan’er didn’t know the words they didn’t speak, but she remembered that night sleeping in the duty room, she seemed to dream – in the dream, her father and mother held her together, like holding the most brilliant and precious treasure in the world.
At the start of the new semester, Qi Qi completely withdrew from their group, with similar excuses each time – finishing homework, teacher looking for her, tutoring classmates. Until one day when Huan’er ran into her in the parking garage, laughing and chatting with another girl as they passed by, she realized all those were just excuses – Qi Qi simply had new friends.
Of course, she would have new friends, but why not just say so directly?
Huan’er sent a somewhat angry message: Qi, you could have just told me you wanted to walk with others.
She didn’t receive a reply until almost eleven at night – I’ll be walking with others from now on.
Just that one sentence, a neither warm nor cold notification.
During break the next day, Huan’er couldn’t help running to the liberal arts building to find her. Qi Qi was being held by two girls, about to walk out. Seeing her, she stopped, “Something wrong?”
As if she couldn’t come without having business.
Huan’er suddenly felt angry, “You’re suddenly like this, are you hiding something from me?”
Qi Qi let her companions leave first, folding her arms, “Don’t you often walk with Liao Xinyan? Does it make any difference whether I’m there or not?”
“Liao Xinyan she…” Huan’er was at a loss for words, suddenly feeling hurt, “How can you say that?”
Qi Qi gave a derisive laugh, “You’re not the Chen Huan’er from before anymore, the Chen Huan’er who only had me as a friend.”
She needed to get back, she’d be late if she didn’t run back now.
But Huan’er’s feet felt nailed to the ground, many words stuck in her chest unable to come out.
“You should head back,” Qi Qi said before turning to catch up with her companions.
Something must be wrong – Qi Qi wasn’t the type to lose her temper for no reason. But Chen Huan’er couldn’t think of a reason no matter how hard she tried, and worse, she seemed to have lost her chance to ask.
Qi Qi stopped answering her calls. She would occasionally reply to messages, but when asked about the reason, always with one sentence: “You’re overthinking it.” Sometimes they’d run into each other on campus, share a smile, and at most ask “How did the exam go” – they went from friends back to classmates.
The most ordinary kind of classmates, only staying at the level of acquaintances.
Chen Huan’er fell into a slump because of this, was listless in class, and was often distracted while doing problems. Unable to find a solution, one afternoon during a self-study break she asked Du Man, “If that exercise leader girl suddenly stopped talking to you, what do you think would be the reason?”
Du Man was eating bread with one hand while still writing with the other, “She wouldn’t. Besides, who suddenly stops talking to people?”
Huan’er doodled on paper, “Exactly, there must be a reason.”
“Did you do something wrong to offend her?”
“No.”
“A misunderstanding that wasn’t cleared up?”
“No.”
Du Man stopped writing, “Then they have their reasons but don’t want to tell you. Don’t think about it anymore.”
Huan’er sighed, “Losing a friend like this, what a shame.”
Du Man casually stuffed half her bread into her backpack and took a couple of sips of water, “You can find new friends if you lose one, but you can’t get back lost time.”
Machine, machine. Huan’er thought, but unconsciously took out her exercise book and started working on problems.
Just then, a boy from another class burst into the classroom panting, “Song Cong, Jing Qichi’s hurt, quick, go to the infirmary.”
Before he finished speaking, Song Cong “swoosh” stood up, and Huan’er, after a moment’s delay, dropped her pen and ran out too.
The provincial first-tier club was organizing selections next week to prepare for the youth super league. A coach from the football school who had trained Jing Qichi since childhood specifically recommended him out of appreciation for his talent and having won the MVP in major competitions, he was determined to succeed. Since winter break he had been hanging out with the football school crew, all his thoughts on this selection. Jing Qichi’s parents were even prepared to transfer him at any time.
Yet he got injured at this time.
In the infirmary, six or seven boys in sportswear, usually the most boisterous, now looked like small flowers ravaged by a storm gathered around the bed with grave expressions. Song Cong pushed through the crowd, “What happened?”
A boy answered for him, “During the match two people collided, and the captain was pressed underneath. Seemed fine at first, but after running a few steps he suddenly collapsed, couldn’t even stand up.”
Jing Qichi’s face was deathly pale, large drops of sweat rolling down his forehead, his expression extremely pained. The teacher applying ice suggested, “Better go to the hospital for an X-ray, see if the bone’s injured.”
Song Cong immediately directed Huan’er, “Go hail a taxi at the gate, we’ll head back first.” Then he lifted Jing Qichi onto his back, saying in a very, very small voice, “Don’t hurt your knee again no matter what.”