2023

On the way from the hotel to the airport, Xiao Qi was driving when she suddenly said to Chen Yue, “Oh right, sis, did you see the kraft paper bag in the back seat?”

“Mm?”

Chen Yue lifted her heavy eyelids. Every time a film wrapped, it was hard for her to rest well. On top of that, she’d gotten a call from her cousin early that morning, only to learn that Chen Xiaoping had been hospitalized for surgery and had kept it from her.

After hanging up, she asked Xiao Qi to book her a flight back to Guangdong. Then, in the narrow gaps of her packed schedule, she went to knock on Chi Xiaoman’s door again, told her she might have to break her promise, and got a hug in return, which eased her nerves a little.

Chen Yue found the kraft paper bag Xiao Qi had mentioned on the other seat in the back.

“What is this?”

“I don’t know.” Xiao Qi shook her head. “When I came down to drive just now, I saw it on the hood.”

Then she explained, “But I already opened it to check. It’s a USB drive, maybe some materials from the crew for you?”

“Okay.” Chen Yue nodded. She also fished out the USB drive Xiao Qi had mentioned from the kraft paper bag.

It was tiny and looked new. Other than that, there was no name on the bag.

“If you’re still not at ease, sis, you can give it to me first. I’ll check it for you and then hand it back,” Xiao Qi said again.

“No need.” Chen Yue lowered her eyes and saw new messages from her cousin. The other party told her—

Chen Xiaoping was very unhappy after finding out she was rushing back, and had even tried to refuse her visit by changing the surgery time. She also repeatedly expressed displeasure at her cousin for meddling in other people’s business.

Compared with an unsigned USB drive, Chen Xiaoping’s situation seemed more urgent. Chen Yue replied to her cousin with exhaustion, then put the USB drive back into the kraft paper bag. “I’ll look at it when I have time.”

“Okay.”

Xiao Qi didn’t say more. She glanced at Chen Yue in the rearview mirror and probably guessed she was in a bad mood because of Chen Xiaoping, so she sighed.

“Sis, why don’t you rest a bit in the car?”

“Okay.” Chen Yue smiled faintly. “I’m fine. Drive carefully.”

“Alright.”

The car continued smoothly toward the airport.

Chen Yue closed her eyes for a moment, but her thoughts still wouldn’t settle. She opened them again and quietly watched the scenery slide past the window.

She suddenly wanted to call Chi Xiaoman, thinking that hearing her voice might make her feel much better. But then she also thought Chi Xiaoman might be finishing breakfast and catching up on sleep, or busy with some wrap-up matters after the crew had finished for the day.

So she didn’t call.

She chose to save that precious phone call for after she arrived at the hospital and the inevitable argument and confrontation with Chen Xiaoping.

In truth, their relationship had eased quite a bit over the years, and for the most part they kept things peaceful.

Maybe it was because Chen Yue had found success in a career Chen Xiaoping didn’t support, or maybe because Chen Xiaoping had gradually felt the helplessness that came with growing old.

She probably understood that she no longer had a say in Chen Yue’s affairs, and also understood that Chen Yue had completely cut herself off from the path she wanted her to take starting from the year she turned twenty-three. So she had no choice but not to interfere, and most of the time gave up arguing with her.

Still, Chen Xiaoping was stubborn and set in her ways. On many small matters, she would always get stuck in her own head, unable to work things out, and no one could talk her out of it. Even though their relationship had eased, that part had never really changed.

After flying back to the old hometown where Chen Xiaoping lived, Chen Yue rushed straight to the hospital without stopping. Chen Xiaoping had already been pushed into the operating room.

Her cousin came over to greet her. “Your mom was still complaining before she went in, saying I shouldn’t have told you.”

Her tone was a little helpless. “She’ll probably still be mad at you when she wakes up from surgery.”

Chen Yue rubbed between her brows. “That’s just how she is.”

Her cousin sighed. Seeing how tired Chen Yue looked from hurrying over, she didn’t say more, only briefly explained Chen Xiaoping’s surgery—

a minor cyst operation, not dangerous. It was just that after the test results came out, Chen Xiaoping insisted that no one tell Chen Yue, and also insisted on not going to a hospital in Guangzhou. No matter how many family members tried to persuade her, Chen Xiaoping firmly believed such a small surgery could be handled at a local hospital. There was no need to trouble Chen Yue, and no need to go somewhere else and wait around for a bed.

No one knew what Chen Xiaoping was thinking. Her daughter was so capable; she could easily have helped arrange a hospital with better medical conditions. Yet Chen Xiaoping was so stubborn, refusing to spend any more of Chen Yue’s money and repeatedly insisting that she would shoulder it herself. Even on the day of surgery, after learning that Chen Yue was rushing back, Chen Xiaoping strongly demanded that everyone who wanted to stay and take care of her leave. In the end, she only reluctantly left her cousin behind.

This hospital was already very old, its walls yellowed, its lighting yellowed too. After hearing her cousin out, Chen Yue quietly looked at the wall, rubbed her brow, and said slowly, “She’s always been like that. No matter how many times you say it, she won’t change.”

“True.” Her cousin looked at her for a moment, then seemed to think of something and patted her shoulder. “Actually, you’re a lot like her too.”

Chen Yue lowered her head and stared at her own shadow in the corridor without denying it.

“Mm, I know.”

Her cousin didn’t say anything else, just sighed and kept her company in silence. That year, after getting sick and returning to the old hometown, her cousin never went back to Shanghai.

She went from being a young woman who insisted on getting onstage to perform in plays, someone relatives described as a little crazy, to a middle-aged woman earning three or four thousand a month in her hometown, spending every day with her mother and aunt talking about the small, trivial things of daily life, as if she had completely forgotten the version of herself who had gritted her teeth and fought in Shanghai.

One year, Chen Yue had asked her cousin whether she wanted to return to Shanghai. But her cousin had answered very firmly, “No.”

So Chen Yue never asked again, and also withdrew the business card she had wanted to pass along. Because life seemed to be like this: at some sudden moment, it would reach a turning point, then completely veer onto a different road.

The operating room door opened.

Chen Xiaoping was pushed out. She lay on the hospital bed, still wearing the surgical cap, not yet awake, her mouth slightly open and her expression a little odd, looking like a newborn baby.

It seemed only in the past year or two that she had suddenly aged so much; wrinkles had appeared on her face, her figure had grown smaller and smaller, she dyed her hair more and more often, yet the white strands still kept increasing.

“The anesthesia should wear off in about another hour before she wakes,” the doctor instructed from the side.

“Okay, thank you.” Chen Yue replied with lowered eyes.

Chen Xiaoping was pushed into the ward.

It was an eight-bed room, not very spacious, with curtains between each bed to protect the patients’ privacy. On the flight back, Chen Yue had wondered whether she should switch Chen Xiaoping to a private room.

But considering that Chen Xiaoping might get angry after waking up, and might even stubbornly get out of bed and refuse to stay, Chen Yue had to give up the idea.

After entering the ward, her cousin went out to call the relatives and also take care of some work matters.

Chen Yue avoided the gazes falling on her in the ward and sat quietly behind the curtain, watching Chen Xiaoping gradually wake up.

Chen Xiaoping woke faster than the doctor had said. After only about forty minutes, she had already slowly come to. That was just how she was; she was highly competitive and liked to be first in everything, apparently no exception even here.

The first second she saw Chen Yue, Chen Xiaoping squeezed her eyes shut, clearly not wanting to talk to her.

“The movie is done. We wrapped. It didn’t delay my work.”

Chen Yue looked at her tightly closed eyelids and said simply.

Chen Xiaoping still kept her eyes shut.

Chen Yue looked at her.

For a long time.

Then, suddenly, she saw her own face in Chen Xiaoping’s aged features.

In some ways, she disliked the way Chen Xiaoping always looked at everything with knitted brows and a cold face, which was why every time she realized that, she swore she would never become like that. She always wanted to be gentle, mature, and good at handling conflict and problems.

But in the end, the one thing she least wanted to share with Chen Xiaoping still inevitably appeared—

hiding herself away, believing she could bear everything alone, and, with stubbornness and a hard attitude, secretly keeping things from the people who cared about and loved her, even deceiving them.

And because she had repeatedly seen this in Chen Xiaoping.

Every time she encountered this kind of situation, she felt irritation, resistance, and a sensitive silence, to the point that even when Chen Yue wanted to deal with it, it was still difficult to truly solve the problems between them.

But.

Now it was different.

Chen Yue felt that she could learn from Chi Xiaoman and be a little more patient, not let fear rise just because she felt this kind of conflict always surfaced in herself, and then ignore it again and again.

So she told Chen Xiaoping, “But if you had told me earlier, I could’ve arranged a lot of things better, instead of rushing back like this in the morning and missing a very important date because of it.”

Chen Xiaoping’s eyelids twitched.

She opened them a little.

Still lying in bed, she looked at Chen Yue with a slightly slanted gaze.

Probably trying to ask: what date?

If she could have spoken, it would probably have been that straightforward, sharp-sounding tone of hers, the kind that came out because she talked too quickly.

Chen Yue didn’t say more. She didn’t expect to make everything clear to Chen Xiaoping all at once.

She just suddenly missed Chi Xiaoman very much.

She tucked the blanket more neatly around Chen Xiaoping, then said, “Sleep a little. Don’t force yourself.”

At any time, she missed Chi Xiaoman very much.

Chen Xiaoping let out a strained breath, seeming as though she still wanted to say something, but the anesthesia kept her from speaking clearly. She only muttered a few indistinct words. Realizing she couldn’t finish the sentence, she had no choice but to close her eyes again.

Her cousin finished her call and came in, then packed away the laptop she had used for work into the computer bag before lowering her voice to ask Chen Yue, “Auntie still hasn’t woken up?”

“She just woke for a moment.” Chen Yue said that, then glanced at the kraft paper bag she had hurriedly set on the bedside table and thought for a moment before asking her cousin, “Can I borrow the computer?”

Her cousin agreed.

Chen Yue asked whether there were any important files in there that hadn’t been backed up. Her cousin shook her head, saying most of what was on her computer were just simple files, and she had already sent them to her colleagues. Seeing the USB drive in Chen Yue’s hand, she generously said, “You can just use it. Worst case, if it breaks, you buy me a new one.”

Chen Yue smiled and nodded, saying she would definitely take responsibility for it.

Only then did she take the computer and sit down on the blue chair outside the ward.

She took the USB drive out of the kraft paper bag.

Inserted it into her cousin’s laptop.

There were no malicious files on the USB drive. The contents looked safe; it only held a video.

So it really had been left by someone from the crew.

But why leave it anonymously?

Chen Yue couldn’t figure it out.

So she simply clicked on the video in the USB drive.

Perhaps because it was filmed in an old hospital corridor, the image that opened was extremely blurry and pixelated. For an instant, she almost thought she had suddenly returned to more than ten years ago, to an era when imaging technology was nowhere near as advanced as it was now.

In the center of the video was only a girl holding up a birthday cake with both hands.

Her hair was a little messy, as if she had just done something furtive before. She wore a very ordinary purple-red jacket, old-fashioned and out of date, like someone left behind in the past.

The birthday candles on the cake in her hands were colorful, like neon. Probably worried the candles would burn down too quickly, her eyes were a little flustered when she looked toward the camera, and there was a great deal of fullness in the youthful face before it.

“Chi Xiaoman.” A voice came from behind the camera, familiar, a voice she hadn’t heard in ten years. “What do you think you’ll be doing ten years from now?”

“Isn’t this Sister Chen Tong’s birthday?” Chi Xiaoman asked cautiously as she carried the cake over. Probably finding it strange, she scrunched up her nose at the camera in the dim light. “Why are you asking me?”

“Since I asked, then I’ll ask everyone together,” Lang Lang said from behind the camera, and also shifted the camera to the side—

and just like that, the twenty-three-year-old Chen Tong was revealed. She was already wearing a crown-shaped hat. Probably a little surprised that the camera had suddenly turned to her, but she still gave the lens a very soft smile.

“Fine.” Chi Xiaoman’s youthful voice came through. At that time, her voice wasn’t as gentle as it was now; it was a little high-pitched, and she spoke very quickly. She probably didn’t know that many years later, many people would say her voice was too sharp, ugly, a bit too affected… so she would practice in front of the mirror again and again, and in the end force herself to change the habit of speaking so fast.

The camera turned back. Her eyes looking straight into the lens were a little red, a little damp, as if she had just cried. But she still thought about the question very carefully, opening her imagination to the future like a baby bird,

“Ten years, so long. But I’ll definitely already be living in a big house. This house will be very pretty and very spacious, much, much bigger than the one we have now. When I get home and open the fridge, it’ll definitely be full of iced drinks, every brand of bottled water, and fresh beef, pork, shrimp, fish…”

She rattled on in a jumble.

Chi Xiaoman seemed to think she’d said too much, and so looked a little embarrassed at Chen Tong beside her.

“In short, I’ll have filmed a lot of the roles I want to film, and Neon should already be made—”

At that point, she suddenly looked at the camera and lifted her chin. “Of course, it will definitely be made by the three of us too.”

“That’s more like it,” Lang Lang answered from behind the camera. “Anything else?”

“Yes.” Chi Xiaoman probably felt the cake was tiring to hold, so she carefully set it down, then looked back at the camera following her and said with a grin,

“Then I’ll invest in your movie with all the money in the world, and your script won’t get changed by a single word.”

Chen Tong’s laughter came from outside the frame, very soft and blurry, then quickly faded away. Chi Xiaoman pressed her lips together in embarrassment.

Lang Lang clicked her tongue. “You really have ambition.”

Then she shifted the camera toward Chen Tong again.

“What about your Sister Chen Tong? Why aren’t you saying something about your Sister Chen Tong?”

The room wasn’t lit; only the dim, murky glow of the colored candles shone through. Chen Tong didn’t look at the camera. Her eyes curved as she turned her face slightly, gazing at Chi Xiaoman, whose face in the frame now occupied only half the image.

“You don’t get it, Sister Chen Tong. I’m saving that for the very end.” Chi Xiaoman’s voice drew the camera back. She sounded a little shy, a little cautious, and a little proud. “She’ll definitely keep making the movies she loves.”

Light and shadow flowed on. Chi Xiaoman’s face opened up in the frame again. She looked at the camera, her eyes bright as she imagined the future. “By then I’ll have earned lots and lots and lots of money, so she can only make the movies she loves. She won’t have to worry about anything else; she can just make movies.”

The camera slowly pulled back during this speech, framing both of them completely in the center of the image. Chen Tong still didn’t look at the camera; she was still watching Chi Xiaoman from the side. Even though the light was blurry, it was still obvious that the way she gazed at her was especially gentle.

“She’ll become a very excellent actress. Mm, probably only in films, because making films should be much simpler than making TV dramas. I’m not saying films are easy to act in, just that I think film actors can simply focus on acting and not worry about all the other messy stuff.”

The candles were halfway burned down, but Chi Xiaoman’s dreams for the future still hadn’t ended.

“And maybe by then she’ll have already won Best Actress. Oh, not maybe—she should already have won Best Actress. At the awards ceremony, she’ll tell everyone she has two people she’s most, most grateful to, and after wrapping every day, she’ll still bring me the fried sticky rice cakes I like to eat and things like that.”

Light flowed through the frame, and Chen Tong’s face seemed kissed by the sea. She looked at Chi Xiaoman tenderly and said nothing.

After hearing this, Lang Lang went, “Huh? Chi Xiaoman, do you even have any ambition? Ten years from now and you’re still only eating fried sticky rice cakes?”

“Huh?” Chi Xiaoman muttered. “Fine, then change it to oden. Sister Chen Tong will definitely buy me every single one of them too.”

Chen Tong laughed.

She reached out and patted Chi Xiaoman on the head, the curve of her eyes seeming to hold a glimmering light.

“Alright. Then what do you want to say to her ten years from now?” Lang Lang pressed on.

“Mm—mm—” This question seemed difficult for Chi Xiaoman. She was actually someone who was good at living in the present, not at speaking to the future, so she thought as hard as she could for a while before saying slowly,

“Sister Chen Tong, are you happy now?”

“Pfft—” Lang Lang was laughing so hard behind the camera she nearly toppled over.

The camera shook wildly with her for a good while, never quite focusing, never capturing Chen Tong’s expression at that moment clearly.

“No, no, do it again.” Only after Chi Xiaoman’s voice came back did the shaky camera refocus. This time it focused on Chi Xiaoman’s face. She was holding the cake and looking at the camera, the tips of her ears a little red from what she had just said.

“It should be—”

She glanced at Chen Tong beside her again.

At that moment, she probably had a lot she wanted to say, but then suddenly remembered something. So she only gave a shy little smile, hiding her eyes behind the swaying colored candlelight, and then said something extremely plain.

“Sister Chen Tong, is the birthday cake I bought you this year delicious?”

-

The video ended.

The screen paused on a black frame.

It reflected Chen Yue’s pale, exhausted face.

It’s hard to accurately describe how she felt after watching that video.

Rationally, she should have calmed down and seriously considered who had copied this video onto the USB drive and left it for her, given that Lang Lang was no longer in this world.

If she had received such an important gift after Neon wrapped, did that mean Chi Xiaoman had also received an identical USB drive at the same time?

But she was completely unable to think about these things, and even less able to guess whether the person who had left this video for her meant well or ill.

Because—

Chi Xiaoman in the video was too real, and too close to her, so close that it felt as if she could reach out and touch her.

And because—

Ten years really was very long, so long that even though this video had appeared again, Chen Yue still couldn’t remember what her own answer had been when that same question was asked on that day.

The person whose answer she wanted might be Chi Xiaoman.

She wanted to go find Chi Xiaoman.

Chen Yue ejected the USB drive, closed her cousin’s laptop, put it back into the computer bag, and stood up from the blue chair.

She went into the ward and drew back the curtain.

She saw that Chen Xiaoping had already woken up and was lying on the hospital bed staring blankly at the ceiling.

Seeing her come in, Chen Xiaoping struggled to keep her eyes open and said as her first sentence, “You’re still here?”

Chen Yue said nothing. She quietly put down her cousin’s computer bag.

“Didn’t you say I made you miss an important date?” Chen Xiaoping muttered. “If you want to leave, then leave. Don’t blame everything on me.”

Chen Yue parted her lips.

Seeing that the two of them both looked wrong, her cousin came over and pulled lightly at Chen Yue’s arm, smoothing things over on her own. “Tongtong, Auntie doesn’t really mean that.”

“Mm, I know.” Chen Yue said.

Chen Xiaoping didn’t continue speaking.

Her cousin looked at both their faces and kept mediating between them. “She’s just sharp-tongued but soft-hearted. Really, she also wants you to go do your own things.”

“If you have something important, go handle it. Don’t worry, I’m here taking care of things.”

“She’s slowly recovering now too. If anything comes up, I’ll call and let you know.”

“Okay, I know.” Chen Yue said in a low voice. “Cousin, I want to talk to her alone for a few minutes.”

Her cousin froze for a few seconds, looked at their faces, and hesitated. “Alright, then don’t argue. We’re outside, after all.”

“Mm, we won’t.” Chen Yue said.

From start to finish, Chen Xiaoping never looked at Chen Yue. She closed her eyes weakly, apparently feeling there was no need to have any conversation about this.

Her cousin sighed, lifted the curtain, and went out.

Chen Yue thought for a moment, then sat down on the chair beside Chen Xiaoping’s bed. “Feeling better?”

Chen Xiaoping forced her eyelids open. “If you want to go, then go. Don’t worry, I won’t cause you any trouble.”

There was no real tone to it. Her voice had little strength. In recent years, that was always how Chen Xiaoping talked to Chen Yue; she had no objection to any of her choices, but probably wasn’t very happy inside either.

Looking at her, Chen Yue once again understood deeply what Chi Xiaoman must feel when she saw her always choosing to shoulder things alone.

For a long time.

Chen Yue spoke.

“If it were the old me, I wouldn’t go, and I wouldn’t tell you what I really thought either.”

Chen Xiaoping said nothing.

The ward was noisy with people coming and going. Chen Yue kept her voice very low.

“I would stay by your bed, but I wouldn’t talk to you either, because I’d think you clearly could have told me earlier and let me handle this properly. And you probably wouldn’t talk to me either, because you’d think I was only reluctantly staying here to keep watch over you.”

“We’d both give each other a lot of looks, but after two days, maybe three, we’d probably end up talking to each other because of some ordinary little thing, and both pretend this never happened.”

Chen Xiaoping’s tightly shut eyelids trembled.

For some reason, even though Chen Yue was talking to her, she suddenly thought of Chi Xiaoman. She thought of Chi Xiaoman kneeling by the bed in the narrow space, pulling her into a hard embrace; thought of Chi Xiaoman having many questions she wanted to ask but only asking whether she wanted candied sweet potatoes; thought of Chi Xiaoman standing in the snow and waving hard at her; thought of Chi Xiaoman saying, “If you say what’s hurtful, there’ll be a reward.”

So Chen Yue closed her eyes. For once, she didn’t become agitated in front of Chen Xiaoping because of some childhood trigger. Instead, she was able to calmly voice thoughts she considered conflicted, selfish, unglamorous, impossible to withstand close scrutiny,

“But now, I’d tell you I want to go. Because I always want to do everything perfectly without hurting anyone, so I always handle things in a stubborn way. But in the end, I actually can’t handle these things alone at all. Because I’m not as strong, selfless, or noble as I thought I was.”

“Even worse, if I insist on hiding my thoughts until the end and make a lot of supposedly clever decisions, I’ll end up causing even more trouble for the people I love.”

“Because I really am your daughter, but I’m also selfish and willful. I blame you for not telling me earlier, so I could’ve avoided making choices like this all the time.”

“But during this time, there’s one person who made me understand completely that I don’t want to be as stubborn as you anymore.”

“So I’ll tell you I want to go.”

“And I’ll also tell you that while I’m saying these things to you, I really want to run from your side and go see her.”

The USB drive she had taken out was still in her pocket.

Chen Yue gripped it tightly, her knuckles pressing hard enough to hurt, forcing her fingers to curl. The USB drive was very light, because it only held a video from ten years ago. Yet it also seemed very heavy, because it might contain ten years’ worth of time.

She smiled at Chen Xiaoping, who still had her eyes tightly shut.

“But I’ll still stay here with you.”

Those words seemed to surprise the stubborn, opinionated Chen Xiaoping. She slowly opened her eyes, looking at Chen Yue as if she found her strange. But she only parted her lips and said nothing.

“Because this is the trouble you brought me by not telling me in advance. And because this is the responsibility I should bear as your daughter.”

“Because when I was little, you also rushed over from very far away to take care of me just because I was sick.”

“Even, when I didn’t know it, you might have missed a lot of chances to get love and work because of me. Although I still don’t approve of that choice of yours now.”

The ward was noisy, Chen Yue’s voice very soft.

“But I’ve always firmly believed that the person I like wouldn’t be so childish, so weak, so one-sided that if I don’t go to her immediately now, she’d get mad at me and even run away again.”

“She would never do that.”

“I believe her.”

Chen Yue’s words went on and on.

In truth, she was thirty-three this year, but her relationship with her mother was still strange, and she had never spoken to Chen Xiaoping so much, never expressed so many of her true feelings. Because she thought Chen Xiaoping wouldn’t understand. Because she thought there was no need to say it. Because she had never thought that this unresolved problem needed solving.

But.

If you’ve eaten candy, you should say what’s hurt.

Thirty-three-year-old Chen Yue suddenly began to believe this sentence, and after realizing she had spoken all her unglamorous, truthful inner thoughts aloud, she missed Chi Xiaoman even more—the one who had taught her this by example and by word.

You don’t have to be too perfect. Because there is no perfect solution for many things.

You can speak up when you feel wronged.

Even if that grievance isn’t clean or noble.

Even if thinking about the person you love at your mother’s bedside isn’t noble.

Even if saying it out loud won’t change anything.

But somehow, that didn’t seem to matter either.

The world wouldn’t collapse because of this. Chen Xiaoping wouldn’t point at her nose and curse her for being unfilial and tell her to get lost. Chi Xiaoman wouldn’t call from far away to blame her for breaking her promise, and she certainly wouldn’t get angry just because of this and think Chen Yue wasn’t worthy of going to find her anymore…

Chen Yue suddenly began to believe this.

And after she finished speaking.

Chen Xiaoping fell into a long silence. This was how she had lived her whole life: stubborn, unable to accept other people’s opinions, often unable to admit it even when she knew someone else was right because she cared about face. She might think Chen Yue’s words were strange, and might not be able to understand them immediately.

But in the end.

She looked at her for a while, then closed her eyes, seeming tired, and only said one sentence,

“Do whatever you want.”

Without much tone.

Chen Yue felt relieved because of that.

Because she knew Chen Xiaoping well; she understood this was Chen Xiaoping’s way of showing she had listened to everything.

After that, Chen Xiaoping closed her eyes and fell asleep again.

Her cousin came in and asked worriedly whether their conversation had gone smoothly.

Chen Yue smiled at her cousin, then looked at Chen Xiaoping in the hospital bed and said,

“Let her sleep for a while.”

Probably because of the anesthesia, Chen Xiaoping fell asleep very quickly.

After she had fallen asleep.

Chen Yue said something to her cousin, then took her phone and went outside the ward, wanting to exercise her right to show weakness in front of Chi Xiaoman.

She called Chi Xiaoman.

Chi Xiaoman didn’t answer.

Chen Yue thought maybe she just hadn’t seen it, so she called a second time. Then the other end of the line played a robotic female voice informing her that the call could not be connected at the moment.

A strange sense of alarm rose sluggishly in Chen Yue.

She wanted to call Xiao Qi and ask her to check on Chi Xiaoman for her.

But before she could dial.

She first saw several missed calls, as well as a WeChat message Xiao Qi had sent in the afternoon:

[ Sis, Teacher Chi just asked me which hospital your mom is in. I couldn’t get through to you, so I told her first. That should be fine, right? ]

The message had been sent five hours and forty-nine minutes earlier than now. In other words, if Chi Xiaoman was coming to find her, she should have already arrived.

Chen Yue suddenly felt an uncontrollable tightness in her chest. She couldn’t hold her phone steady; raising her head in a daze, she looked at the people moving back and forth in the corridor and suddenly felt a sense of drifting, of losing control.

She forced herself to hide the phone in her pocket.

She also forced herself to steady her steps, staggering toward the elevator, her fingers trembling as she pressed the button. In the elevator’s flashing red light, she watched it climb floor by floor.

She kept calling Chi Xiaoman.

No answer.

The elevator went up one floor—

Chen Yue fixed her gaze on the numbers above the doors, clenched her phone tightly, kept dialing, and kept pressing it to her ear.

The elevator continued upward—

The robotic female voice on the phone kept reminding her that the call could not be connected.

The elevator door opened—

Chen Yue lowered her face, unsteady on her feet, and stepped into the elevator together with the noisy, shifting crowd around her.

Someone inside pressed the button for the first floor.

The elevator descended.

The crowd packed inside was loud and crowded. Chen Yue lowered her eyes, hiding her face in her collar, when she vaguely heard someone say, “Hey, do you guys know? Someone—”

Ding—

The elevator opened.

Several people squeezed in one after another and stood in front of Chen Yue. One of them was especially cautious; after getting in, they hunched their shoulders, trying their best not to bump into anyone.

Chen Yue held her phone and listened to the robotic female voice on the call repeating over and over that the other party’s phone could not be connected.

She lowered her gaze.

She saw that this person was wearing a very ordinary pair of white pants. Maybe it had rained outside, because there were splashes of mud on the cuffs.

The elevator was packed. The person was jostled back a step and almost stepped on Chen Yue’s foot, so they quickly lowered their head and, very fast and very softly, said, “Sorry.”

Chen Tong couldn’t help stepping forward.

Before she could speak, someone in the elevator suddenly exclaimed in surprise,

“Huh? Chi Xiaoman?”

[Author’s Note]

On time with Little Neon’s sixty-third day [sunglasses][sunglasses]

TL Note:

“If you’ve eaten candy, you should say what’s hurt” (吃了糖就要把自己的委屈说出来) means if someone has received comfort or kindness, they should also speak honestly about their hurt or grievance.