Refusal

Provincial Hospital’s Gland Differentiation Ward.

“You said the ward’s tight, the lottery’s competitive, and in the provincial hospital’s gland differentiation department, where single rooms are only released for serious cases, they saved a single room for you,” Xu Yaqing said from the rocking chair in the private room as she peeled a peach, clicking her tongue repeatedly. “Dr. Hua, are you getting special treatment?”

Hua Yu closed her eyes to rest. She didn’t even bother lifting her eyelids. “Don’t tell my parents I’m in the hospital.”

Xu Yaqing snorted in response.

Hua Yu thought for a moment, then added, “And don’t tell Auntie either.”

“That’s not guaranteed,” Xu Yaqing said, raising her voice. “My mom likes you more than she likes me. Every time she calls, she asks how you’re doing!”

Hua Yu said calmly, “Tell Auntie I’ll make time to visit her.”

“You can forget it. Your ‘time’ is basically a metaphysical concept. Nobody knows when you’ll have any.” Xu Yaqing didn’t take the bait.

Hua Yu opened her eyes and gave her a cool look. “…Then tell Auntie I’m in the hospital because, when you were at my place, you accepted a neighbor’s box of pastries with extremely high omega pheromone content.”

Xu Yaqing stared. “How is that my…”

“I’ll also tell Auntie you often come to my place during my heat cycle, and you always bring some weird omega pheromones with you. Different ones every time.”

Only then did Xu Yaqing realize Hua Yu was truly ruthless.

“Shut up already!” Xu Yaqing slammed the half-peeled peach down in front of Hua Yu.

Hua Yu said nothing more. Her body was still weak; a few sentences left her tired.

Xu Yaqing pulled out her phone and replied to messages for a while. When she looked up again, Hua Yu still hadn’t fallen asleep.

“You’re not going to nap?” Xu Yaqing said. “Your face is whiter than mine would be after three days dead.”

“You have yellow skin,” Hua Yu said. She had slept too long and couldn’t sleep now; bored, she rarely had the mood to spar with Xu Yaqing, but her spirits were clearly low, so even her banter was half-hearted. “No foreign blood.”

“Oh, sure, sure,” Xu Yaqing said indignantly. “You do. Slim waist, long legs, fair skin, sharp features—if you’re that pretty, why aren’t you a celebrity?”

The corner of Hua Yu’s mouth twitched.

Xu Yaqing put down her phone and moved closer. “Enough about that. You really won’t let Wei Yin come visit you?”

Hua Yu’s expression remained blank, with no reaction.

Xu Yaqing clicked her tongue. “She’s been messaging me on WeChat every so often, asking when she can come see you. I don’t even know what to say. You keep telling me to stall her; that’s not really a solution.”

Hua Yu lowered her head and looked at the needle mark on the back of her hand. Her voice was flat. “Keep stalling.”

Xu Yaqing was carefree enough that she couldn’t pick up the complicated emotion in Hua Yu’s tone. She only felt Hua Yu was probably worried Wei Yin would be upset seeing her like this, so she changed the subject again.

“Hey, you don’t know this, but while you were unconscious these past two days, we went to the police station to give statements. There was this policewoman I know, and she told me about Wei Yin’s statement.”

Hua Yu looked up at her. Mentioning Wei Yin made her a little listless, but she still couldn’t bring herself to refuse.

Xu Yaqing became animated, speaking with vivid expression as she recounted from beginning to end how Wei Yin had described everything, how indignant she’d been, how angry she’d been that she’d trembled. “Even the police were stunned. Nobody would’ve expected that little girl to look so soft and weak, but she had no less presence than anyone else.”

“Wei Yin actually knows a lot about the law too. She knew this was an accident involving dangerous goods, with subjective intent, and she also said you hadn’t done anything that could be considered ‘implied conduct’ to cause the other party’s misunderstanding; there was no element of incitement or indulgence in creating the danger, so the other party should bear full responsibility and be dealt with severely.”

Xu Yaqing repeated it and even gave herself a thumbs-up. “When I was in school, I didn’t have memory this good. And those words came out of Wei Yin’s mouth—shocking.”

Hua Yu listened with her head lowered. After a long while, she said softly, “Nothing to be surprised about.”

“That’s still not surprising?” Xu Yaqing said. “Her expression at the time was like she wanted to eat someone alive.”

A faint curve touched Hua Yu’s lips, but her gaze was complicated. “When she was little, she lived with her mother. Two omegas would always be looked down on by others. She was bullied sometimes, and she didn’t know how to fight back... In college, she even passed the judicial exam. She wanted to understand some law so that later, when things happened, she wouldn’t be bullied all the way to the end.”

Even Hua Yu herself hadn’t expected she would remember even this kind of detail Wei Yin had only mentioned once, and instantly connect it to Wei Yin’s reaction.

“As for what you said about her getting emotional,” Hua Yu let out a light sigh, “rabbits bite too. She’s not a rabbit. She just doesn’t want conflict with anyone; it’s not that she can’t fight.”

Xu Yaqing’s mouth opened wider and wider. In the end, she gave Hua Yu a thumbs-up. “As expected of you. It really has to be you. You’re a pure-love warrior, aren’t you? You care that much about your first love. Isn’t your understanding of Wei Yin a little terrifying? Do you also know what she wore today?”

Hua Yu ignored Xu Yaqing’s teasing and instead thought of the scene of Wei Yin arguing with the police.

Back in college, rumors about Hua Yu had spread, and someone had even edited her photo and used it to fabricate gossip. Wei Yin had argued with people about it more than once.

Hua Yu had been lucky enough to witness it once. The person who never even raised her voice on ordinary days had actually spoken loudly then, her words crisp as she argued with someone and gave not an inch.

The other party was male and a head taller than Wei Yin; even his presence alone was intimidating. But Wei Yin had insisted he couldn’t produce evidence and was just insulting others with empty words. Not only did she call the security office, she also notified their counselor and Hua Yu’s adviser.

Rumor-mongers were usually all bluster; when things went south, they tried to leave. Wei Yin stopped him and was shoved to the ground.

Hua Yu rushed over, only to see that scene.

At the time, she wanted nothing more than to chase after him and hit him, but Wei Yin held her back. Lifting her face, she smiled obediently. “I only scraped my palm. He not only spread rumors in public, he also shoved and bullied a classmate. He definitely won’t get away with just a slap on the wrist.”

Wei Yin had been so happy, happy because she could stand up for Hua Yu and punish a bad person.

But Hua Yu only found it piercing and heartache-inducing.

At the police station, Wei Yin must have worn the same expression, suppressing her anger while questioning the other party with reason and evidence.

When Wei Yin got angry, she was definitely justified, and definitely relentless.

Hua Yu stayed silent for a long time before telling Xu Yaqing, “Take her out to eat. Tell her about my condition and don’t let her worry... and don’t let her stay angry either.”

How could Xu Yaqing possibly refuse? She already liked Wei Yin as a friend; she liked her personality, her character, and her ability. It was precisely because she truly thought of Wei Yin as a friend that she found this hard.

“Then I’ll tell her everything as it is,” Xu Yaqing said with a nod. “Except for the part where you won’t let her see you.”

Hua Yu said nothing, taking the silence as assent.

Before leaving, Xu Yaqing set down the materials Yu Tiantian had given her and also told Hua Yu what the two of them had discussed that day. “That’s basically the situation. Logically, since your body hasn’t been good these past few days, I should’ve brought it to you later. But you kept urging me for it, and I get the feeling Yu Tiantian isn’t holding anything good back. You should look first, then tell me what to do next.”

Hua Yu brightened a little, accepted the materials, and nodded to Xu Yaqing. “Thank you.”

“No need.” Xu Yaqing stood and stretched. “It’s only two in the afternoon. I’m going to beat up Li Leran first, then go find Wei Yin for lunch.”

When Hua Yu heard that, she looked up, clearly disapproving. “Fight?”

“No, I’m going to beat her up one-sidedly,” Xu Yaqing said happily. “I had someone check her schedule. The package she ordered for this afternoon has already arrived, so she’s definitely going to pick it up. I’ll catch her at the right moment and cover her head..."

“If you have time for that, you might as well help me check Wei Yin’s bank transactions,” Hua Yu said helplessly, though she also found it amusing. “If you don’t like Li Leran, then ignore her, or go to her place and talk it out. That’s better than blocking her inside a store, and it’ll reduce the risk of breaking the law.”

Xu Yaqing waved her hand and turned to leave. “Don’t worry. I won’t let your Wei Yin see. I know what I’m doing.”

—

The moment the supposedly unobserved Xu Yaqing stepped out of the hospital, Wei Yin caught her right away.

Wei Yin was waiting at the bus shelter by the hospital entrance, sitting on a stone stool and waiting for Xu Yaqing.

When Xu Yaqing suddenly came face-to-face with Wei Yin, she was startled. “Why are you here!”

Wei Yin’s eyes were red, not in the way someone was about to cry, but red from a bad night’s sleep, sore and blurry from rubbing them too hard.

“I,” Wei Yin stammered, “I wanted to go see Dr. Hua.”

Looking at her pitiful, exhausted little state, Xu Yaqing sighed helplessly. “Omegas aren’t allowed in.”

Wei Yin pressed her lips together. “An omega with scent gland atrophy isn’t allowed either?”

“You saying it like that would make Hua Yu sad if she heard it,” Xu Yaqing said, adopting the tone Hua Yu had taught her and speaking righteously. “She feeds you a pile of nutritional supplements every day and checks your condition every day; the whole point is to cure you. Your glands are recovering now, right? Maybe at some point you’ll start leaking pheromones again, and if that stimulates Hua Yu, then what?”

Wei Yin wanted to say that was impossible. If her glands were really recovering to the point where they began secreting pheromones, Hua Yu would never have left her at home.

But Xu Yaqing sounded so certain that Wei Yin couldn’t refute her. She could only stubbornly turn away and stare blankly at the hospital entrance.

“I give up on you,” Xu Yaqing said. Since Wei Yin was standing there, she couldn’t leave, so she could only keep persuading her. “Even if you’re fine and Dr. Hua is fine, do you still need to follow the hospital rules? What would the other patients think if they saw an omega walking in here? They’d want their own omegas to stay with them too.”

The words “hospital rules” worked better than the nonsense before. Wei Yin was still worried about Hua Yu, but she reluctantly listened and no longer insisted on seeing her.

“That’s more like it,” Xu Yaqing said, patting her on the shoulder. “Come on, follow me to eat and drink something good.”

Wei Yin’s mood was low. “I don’t want to eat or drink.”

Xu Yaqing brought out the big gun. “Hua Yu told me to.”

Wei Yin turned and walked toward the parking garage, stopping beside Xu Yaqing’s car and silently staring at her.

Xu Yaqing: “…Wow, so obedient.”

Unexpectedly bringing Wei Yin along, Xu Yaqing was still debating whether to take her to carry out the beating plan when Wei Yin spoke up.

“It’s the middle of the afternoon. Where are you going to eat and drink?”

Xu Yaqing fell silent. “…Can I say I wanted to handle some private business before picking you up?”

Wei Yin looked out the window. “Oh, then drop me off by the road; I’ll take the bus back.”

“…The bus? You want Hua Yu to think I’m mistreating you.”

Wei Yin spread her hands. “Then give me money for a taxi.”

“No, I said I’d drop you off?” Xu Yaqing was at a loss for words. “I’m just explaining to you that I haven’t randomly started eating and drinking on a beautiful afternoon, living a degenerate life.”

Then she realized something. “You don’t even have taxi fare?”

Wei Yin drew her hands back. “No.”

“Where the hell did your salary go...” Xu Yaqing looked pained. “It looks like Hua Yu is mistreating you.”

“Dr. Hua gave me a card and told me to use it for whatever I wanted,” Wei Yin said without any change in her tone. “I don’t use it.”

Fine. She was still angry.

Xu Yaqing shrank her neck. “Then, sigh... come with me to handle some private business.”

With Wei Yin in tow, and with Hua Yu’s instruction to “go to her place and talk it out,” Xu Yaqing thought for a moment and changed the target of her beating plan from the luxury store to Li Leran’s home.

Li Leran’s home was very close to Xu Yaqing’s parents’ place; it was just one floor above or below, so slipping into the neighborhood was easy for her.

Xu Yaqing brought Wei Yin along and, without any obstruction, made it all the way to the floor below Li Leran’s... place.

Wei Yin stared at the elevator buttons and asked, “Why can’t the other floors be pressed?”

Xu Yaqing sighed. “Protection for rich people. You can only go to the floor where you live.”

“Then how do you find someone?” Wei Yin asked.

By now, she already knew the person Xu Yaqing was looking for was upstairs.

Xu Yaqing was silent for a moment, then held out her hand. “Give me your phone.”

Wei Yin handed it over.

Xu Yaqing typed on Wei Yin’s phone for a while and sent out a text message, then pulled Wei Yin along to stand inside the stairwell.

Not long after, the elevator went up and stopped one floor above.

Xu Yaqing flexed her fists and revealed a sinister smile of complete confidence.