Chapter 56

The scissors were already on the sink, laid out in advance. Yu Min had put them there earlier; she knew she needed them before the bath. The doctor and the caregiver had reminded her more than once. And yet even though she had steeled herself before going into the bathroom, once she was inside and facing Lin Baixin alone, Yu Min still couldn’t quite hold it together. It was as if her whole system had overloaded and frozen in place; for a moment, she stood there at a loss, not knowing what to do.

After a while, Lin Baixin glanced at her back, thought for a moment, then stepped back and said, “Or I can do it myself. I’ll try. You can wait by the door first; if I can’t manage, I’ll call you?”

They were already in here; how could she turn around and leave again? Yu Min took a shallow breath, quietly composed herself, then turned back to face her.

“I’ll do it. Don’t move,” Yu Min said. “Be careful not to hurt your hand again.”

Lin Baixin didn’t move. “Mm. I won’t.”

“I’ll cut off this part of the cuff first, or it’ll be inconvenient later.”

“Up to you.”

“Anything else… that needs help?”

“No.”

“Did you bring everything you need?”

“Should be about all of it.”

Bathing didn’t require much; besides a change of clothes, the other toiletries were already in the bathroom. There was no need to bring anything else.

Yu Min kept her gaze averted the entire time, deliberately avoiding Lin Baixin’s eyes. The scissors were sharp; with just two cuts, she removed half the sleeve. After that, she worked her way upward very carefully and slowly, afraid the scissors might scrape Lin Baixin, though even if they did, it wouldn’t be serious enough to injure her.

Seeing how deliberately she avoided looking, Lin Baixin half-lowered her eyes. The two of them were very close now, and Yu Min herself was dressed rather lightly, only in a thin pajama top and bottoms. Her hair had been half tied up and secured with a barrette. The barrette was Lin Baixin’s; somehow, at some point, Yu Min had taken it and started using it.

As she began cutting the upper part of the sleeve and got close to the shoulder, Lin Baixin suddenly spoke, casually enough, as if she were intentionally shifting both of their attention, asking where Yu Min had found the clip.

“I thought I’d lost it. I couldn’t find it for a long time,” Lin Baixin said. She paused, her gaze dropping to the fair curve of Yu Min’s neck where loose strands of hair had fallen and tangled, and she couldn’t help looking a little longer. “This one looks good on you.”

The barrette had actually just been taken at random from a drawer. The housekeeper had put it in the wrong place while cleaning, which was why Lin Baixin couldn’t find it.

When Yu Min first saw that it was still in unopened packaging, she had torn it open and used it without thinking. Now, hearing Lin Baixin say that, she subconsciously wanted to touch the clip, but forced herself to stop.

She knew it was Lin Baixin’s thing, but once she used it, she used it. Yu Min had no intention of giving it back. To Lin Baixin, it was only a trivial little item; if it was gone, she could just buy another. But to Yu Min, it was different. Her mindset was a little strange; using Lin Baixin’s things felt different from using her own. She just wanted to use Lin Baixin’s.

Using the other person’s things counted as a rather intimate act, Yu Min thought. That was how the boys and girls in her class who were dating behaved. She had her own little private thoughts, and she had always handled them carefully, keeping them hidden yet somehow open and aboveboard at the same time. This was the first time Lin Baixin had noticed and pointed it out in front of her.

Yu Min was steady enough; even after being caught, she didn’t panic. Calmly, she said, “Then I’ll buy you a new one. Last time I couldn’t find my face-washing hair tie, so I just grabbed a clip for my hair. I thought you weren’t using this anymore.”

“Don’t buy one. Use yours,” Lin Baixin said. “I only put it there because I wasn’t using it.”

While they talked, the top was mostly off already. Using scissors was more convenient than forcing it off by hand. In fact, even if they had taken it off normally, it would still have been fine; there was still the inner layer. It was practically like wearing a swimsuit, and Yu Min had seen Lin Baixin in a swimsuit before anyway.

Lin Baixin herself didn’t feel awkward. The innermost layer didn’t need Yu Min’s help; she could take it off herself. As for the pants, scissors weren’t necessary. She could manage with some effort, but to be safe, Yu Min still helped her take them off.

Still, this wasn’t a swimming pool, and the setting was wrong. The atmosphere should have been private, which made it somewhat difficult to make it feel as casual as it would have in a pool.

Yu Min crouched down and did her best to ignore everything in front of her. Lin Baixin was very cooperative, and after that the two of them stopped talking. Inside the enclosed space, the silence was unusually heavy; even a pin drop would have sounded loud.

“Lift it a little,” Yu Min said softly.

Lin Baixin was slightly startled; only after a moment did she do as told.

“…Okay.”

The rest, as before, was left for Lin Baixin to handle herself; Yu Min didn’t need to do it.

A fracture didn’t mean she couldn’t get water on it at all, but she still had to avoid it as much as possible. Washing up with one hand was very difficult, but Yu Min didn’t need to keep helping with that. Lin Baixin would have to handle the rest herself, and after she finished washing, Yu Min would help her dress again.

“I’m going out,” Yu Min said again. This time she actually looked composed; her ears and face seemed normal enough, though her voice was a little low, slightly strained.

After leaving the bathroom, Yu Min didn’t walk away. She waited just outside the door so she could go in at any time if Lin Baixin called, keeping watch while she bathed so nothing would go wrong midway.

The water kept rushing steadily. The double glass door didn’t block the sound; standing outside, Yu Min could hear it clearly… She lowered her eyelids. Perhaps because everything around her was too quiet, the sounds from inside the bathroom seemed especially distinct at this moment.

The lights were on in the living room outside, but the bedroom was dark. The glass door couldn’t completely hide what was happening inside; when one drew close enough, they could still make out faint shadows. But not clearly, and anything she shouldn’t see remained out of view.

The room was stuffy. Yu Min quietly cracked the window open a sliver; a cool breeze slipped through the gap and brushed her face, chilly enough to make her shiver. Only after a while could she finally breathe more comfortably.

Keeping her eyes fixed on the night view outside, Yu Min consciously shut out everything behind the glass door. In the distance, the city lights glimmered like stars in the sky, stretching in winding ribbons all the way to the edge of heaven.

Leaning against the wall, Yu Min unconsciously curled her fingers and tapped idly against it. After a while, she took out her phone and refreshed the screen again.

More than twenty minutes later, the sound of running water stopped.

It was time to go in.

Putting her phone away, Yu Min waited two seconds before replying, as if she hadn’t been paying attention to what was happening inside. Before entering, she even knocked on the door; only after receiving Lin Baixin’s permission did she turn the handle and go in.

The bathroom was humid; the floor was wet, the air was wet, and there was a fresh scent mixed into it, the fragrance of body wash.

Lin Baixin had already put on the innermost layer, just as she had before Yu Min stepped out. The rest still needed Yu Min’s help to put back on.

After bathing, she had to put on a nightgown. For convenience, the nightgown had been specially bought with a side zipper.

The zipper was tiny, not even as big as a fingernail, like a sharp little grain of rice; it was somewhat difficult to manage.

Because of that, when helping her dress, Yu Min had no choice but to brace her fingers against Lin Baixin’s side and touch her skin.

Lin Baixin’s body was smooth too, soft and pale, like tofu. After being out in the wind, Yu Min’s fingertips were cold; compared with Lin Baixin’s warmth, the contrast was especially stark.

The moment Yu Min touched her, Lin Baixin’s reaction was obvious. Her lower abdomen drew in slightly, even her breathing slowed, and her body stiffened unconsciously.

It felt even more stifling.

The bathroom wasn’t small, but the sense of cramped pressure was even stronger. Yu Min deliberately paused for a moment; after two seconds, her fingertips were still pressed against Lin Baixin, and she didn’t move them away.

Lin Baixin could feel it too. She lowered her eyes and looked down.

Yu Min explained, “It’s stuck. Wait a second.”

Lin Baixin withdrew her gaze. “Like that.”

Yu Min fiddled with it beside her for a while; it really did seem like the zipper was stuck. Her hand remained in contact with Lin Baixin the entire time. After a moment, almost casually, her fingertips brushed against Lin Baixin’s skin, faintly and fleetingly, like a dragonfly skimming the water.

Lin Baixin was slow to react, as if she didn’t feel much at all, until Yu Min slid a little farther down along her skin, moving slowly and bit by bit like an inexperienced fish. When her fingers were almost to the iliac bone, Lin Baixin finally noticed and softly said, “Ticklish…”

Yu Min immediately stopped. She still had a sense of restraint and wouldn’t cross that line.

“Sorry,” Yu Min said quietly. This time the zipper wasn’t stuck anymore, and with a light pull she could bring it all the way to the top.

After the nightgown was on, there was still her hair to dry. Lin Baixin stood in front of Yu Min while Yu Min picked up the hair dryer. During that time, her hands once again brushed Lin Baixin’s ears and cheeks, and every so often she had to thread her fingers through Lin Baixin’s hair, touching her scalp.

That was even more sensitive, a faint tingling numbness, as if she’d been shocked.

They stood in front of the mirror. In the reflection, their shadows overlapped slightly, one in front of the other. Yu Min worked carefully; whatever she did, Lin Baixin could see it in the mirror. Halfway through drying her hair, their gazes briefly met in the reflection, then drifted apart again. Both of them remained steady and calm, deliberately avoiding each other.

She dried Lin Baixin’s hair for a very long time, until it was completely dry.

“It’s done,” Yu Min said, unplugging the dryer. “Check it.”

Lin Baixin had been distracted and hadn’t quite come back to herself. Only after being tapped did she tilt her head slightly and look toward Yu Min, absentmindedly.

“See if it’s okay?” Yu Min asked again.

It was already fine; there was no such thing as whether hair drying was okay or not.

Lin Baixin’s lips moved. For no reason at all, she suddenly said, “Put on some hair oil too.”

Yu Min agreed, squeezed two pumps of oil into her hands, rubbed them together a few times, then worked it into Lin Baixin’s hair.

Just taking a bath and cleaning up could easily take two or three hours. Neither of them minded the time or the effort. They took their time, and afterward Lin Baixin asked Yu Min to help her with a few more things, all of which Yu Min went and did.

Once they were in the living room, Yu Min even massaged Lin Baixin, placing Lin Baixin’s foot on her own leg and kneading her ankle first, then her calf, working upward all the way. Her pressure was a little too heavy; the massage hurt a bit, and Lin Baixin let out a muffled groan, unable to suppress a soft, involuntary sound.