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.