Hazy, drifting.
It felt like I’d slept a long time.
The smell of disinfectant hung in the air.
The corner of my mouth felt cool, as if the swelling had gone down.
My right hand was held gently in a warm palm, with something like tenderness in the touch, inexplicably.
Near my ear, a man’s and a woman’s voices spoke low.
“You little brat, this kid fainting is half your fault for scaring her.” The voice carried a note of reproach.
“I’m as wronged as Dou E herself.” The man’s voice was lazy.
“Wronged, my foot. What did the doctor just say—high fever, emotional overload, long-term malnutrition plus low blood sugar. Can you say the first two have nothing to do with you? The poor thing was nearly burning up and you’re over there rambling on.” The originally gentle female voice suddenly rose an octave.
As if too angry to hold back, the palm moved—the woman stood up and gave the man a solid punch.
“Hiss.” The man made a show of crying out in pain.
Then a familiar warmth drew close again, and my right hand was steadily, warmly cradled once more.
“You don’t know—when I was just changing her into the hospital gown, her whole body was thin and scrawny, covered in bruises, not one bit of good skin left.” The voice near my ear paused, choked with emotion. “This child… she’s suffered so much.”
The man’s carefree tone reined itself in, suddenly edged with something sharp.
“Damn it. Tang Shiguo really is a thorough bastard, doing that to his own daughter.
“I should’ve just finished him off that day.”
“Zhou Haiyan! Can you calm down?”
It seemed to have touched a nerve on both sides—neither spoke further.
For a moment, the hospital room fell into an overly heavy silence.
The cool medicine trickled through the needle in the back of my right hand, gradually seeping into my body.
So his name was Zhou Haiyan.
Hazily, a phrase came to mind:
He qing hai yan—rivers clear, seas calm.
“When the rivers run clear and the seas lie calm, the seasons are mild and the harvest is bountiful, the nation prosperous and the people at peace.”
Teacher Li once praised me for having such a good name.
Zhou Haiyan—his name was good too.
His parents must love him very much.
As for my own name—on the day I was born, my mother told my father to name me. Impatient, he just pointed at the small river by the field ridge and said the water looked clear enough, so he called me Tang Heqing. My mother simply agreed.
It wasn’t until I met Teacher Li, and heard her explain it, that I understood even a wild weed could bloom.
The voices near my ear slowly grew hazy.
Under the effect of the medicine, I drifted off to sleep again.
By the time I woke again, it was already afternoon.
“Press here for a moment, parent—don’t let it bleed.”
The last bag of IV fluid had finished.
The nurse pulled out the needle and called over to the man standing nearby.
Zhou Haiyan dragged a stool over and sat down, pressing his rough fingers against the tape on the back of my hand.
The pressure was neither too light nor too heavy.
I pulled my hand back a little, wanting to say I could do it myself.
The moment I opened my mouth, my throat was dry and bitter, my voice hoarse like a duck that had lost its quack.
He held my hand still, reached over to the bedside table, and handed me a paper cup.
“You should rest that throat. It sounds like it’s been through a bombing.”
“……”
Nothing to argue with there.
I took it with my left hand.
I took a sip—the water was just the right temperature, sweet.
Sugar water.
I blinked slowly, letting the sugar water sit in my mouth a moment before swallowing.
There was just the two of us in the room; I didn’t know what to say.
So I just kept my head down, sipping little by little.
After a while.
The man saw enough time had passed and let go of my hand.
“I’ll take you to get an X-ray later. Need to check your ear.”
I instinctively looked up and shook my head.
No need.
The money in my piggy bank could barely cover the cost of the IV.
As for the checkup, that was too expensive. I couldn’t afford it.
Having lost my voice from talking too much, the two of us just stared blankly at each other.
That’s when I remembered.
So I gestured with my hands, using sign language and mouthing words together, afraid he wouldn’t understand.
After puzzling over it for a while, he frowned.
“Wait, are you doing mime over here? All this ah-ah gesturing, I can’t understand a thing.”
I got anxious.
I crossed my left index finger and thumb, rubbed them together, pointed at myself, waved my hand, then pointed at him.
That should be clear enough—I meant I had no money to give him.
Seeing him seem to suddenly get it, I let out a breath of relief.
He said, “You’re saying you wanted to give me your heart? And then changed your mind?”
I choked.
A breath caught in my chest, stuck.
That interpretation was way too far off.
“Alright, alright, quit teasing the kid, you little punk.”
The door opened, and that familiar female voice walked in.
It was Zhou Haiyan’s mother.
I hadn’t gotten a good look at her that morning in the rush.
The two of them actually looked quite alike in their features, but she came across as gentle and soft, not fierce like Zhou Haiyan.
She shoved Zhou Haiyan off the stool without much patience.
Teasing me, was he?
I took the chance to glance at him for confirmation.
The man looked away and rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“……”
So it really was.
Aunt Zhou set the thermos she was carrying down on the table and opened it.
A wave of fragrant rice porridge instantly drifted through the whole room.
She felt my forehead and smiled.
“Here, your fever just broke, have something light. Once you’re better we’ll have something heartier.”
I looked at the softly stewed white porridge in front of me.
Swallowing, I shook my head apologetically.
I had nothing to give back to them.
I had so little to offer.
“You haven’t eaten all day, how could that be alright? Come on, be good.”
I lowered my head and picked at my hands without speaking.
She sighed.
Turned, and gave Zhou Haiyan’s back a slap.
The sound was loud enough to make me flinch.
“This is on you, you brat. The kid must be scared of you again.”
“……”
Zhou Haiyan’s expression was wordless, resigned.
“Fine, fine, fine, it’s me, it’s me. I’ve taken so much blame I could use it to season a dish.”
“If she doesn’t eat this porridge, you’ll be the one paying for it.”
Aunt Zhou pursed her lips toward me, hinting.
“Qingqing, I’ll go beat him up.”
Zhou Haiyan clicked his tongue.
He picked up the bowl beside him.
Stirred it with the spoon, leaned in close.
His sharp eyes held a strange, out-of-place pleading look.
“Ancestor, just eat, would you? We’ve got no grudge between us—are you really going to let me take more hits over this?”
“……”
I couldn’t help but laugh.
I took the bowl and ate it spoonful by spoonful.
“Slowly, no rush.”
Maybe the porridge was too hot.
It burned my eyes.
Tears slid down my cheeks to the corners of my mouth, salty. I tried hard to hold them back but couldn’t.
How could I not understand what they meant by all this kindness?
That’s how my neighbors coaxed their four-year-old to eat.
But I hadn’t been a little kid in a long time.
Even when I was little, my mother never coaxed me to eat like this.
My father hated girls; he wouldn’t let me sit at the table, so I always took some food to a corner and ate by myself.
If I took two pieces of meat, his chopsticks would strike my hand, saying I was greedy and selfish.
If I filled my bowl too much, his palm would land on my face, saying I was lazy and gluttonous.
Every time I ate, I gulped my food down, afraid that if I ate too slowly, the next second my father would smash the bowl and leave me with nothing.
My mother used to brag to the neighbors that I never gave anyone trouble at mealtimes, that I ate like a little piglet.
Her—she only ever saw what she wanted to see.
The tears fell like a broken string of pearls.
Afraid they’d notice, I quickly lowered my head, nearly burying my face in the porridge.
I really wasn’t someone who cried easily before.
The man pulled at a pack of tissues, wanting to hand it over but not daring to.
He swallowed, his voice tight.
“Ma, I think this time it’s your porridge that’s the problem.”
“……”