Chapter 36 Bitter Summer Likes Not to Say Sorry

A few meters away in the ward, Shen Qingyun, seeing Zhao Yixiao finally wake up, also breathed a sigh of relief.

"Yixiao, how are you feeling? Is there anything wrong?" She quickly stood up and asked with concern.

"It's nothing... I've been through this for so many years, I'm used to it." He coughed a few times in a hoarse voice, but his words were meant to reassure her.

"Don't move, I'll go get the doctor for you."

Just as Shen Qingyun was about to run out of the ward after speaking, Zhao Yixiao quickly called out to her, "Wait! Is she... outside?"

They all knew perfectly well who "she" referred to. Upon hearing this, Shen Qingyun stopped in her tracks. She pursed her lips, turned around stiffly, and nodded to him. "Yes, Teacher Zhao couldn't reach your parents just now, so she had no choice but to call her over. She should be sitting at the door right now. Do you need me to call her in for you?"

When Zhao Yixiao heard her ask him that question, he was silent for a moment before shaking his head and refusing, saying, "No need, I... haven't figured out how to face her yet."

After saying that, he looked at Shen Qingyun, who was standing in front of him, neither moving nor speaking, and couldn't help but sigh deeply. He called out to her, "I don't feel uncomfortable right now, let's call the doctor later."

After that, the two remained silent for several minutes, until the one who was standing finally gave in.

She walked back to the bedside and sat down helplessly. Looking at Zhao Yixiao's pale face, she felt somewhat helpless towards him. "Why are you doing this to yourself?"

He understood what the other person meant, but he didn't know how to respond. He looked up at the cold white ceiling of the ward, remained silent for a moment, and then smiled bitterly. "What can someone like me, who may not even have a future, ask for?"

"Zhao Yixiao, don't say such things." Hearing him say that about her, Shen Qingyun's expression changed. She rarely spoke so seriously, but she called him by his full name, and her tone became solemn.

But Zhao Yixiao, lying on the hospital bed, didn't seem to care at all. He forced a smile and sighed, "Qingyun, I'm serious..."

As he spoke, his voice trailed off, and Zhao Yixiao could only take a deep breath and use all his strength to finish his sentence: "I don't want to hold anyone back, no matter who it is."

After she finished speaking, Shen Qingyun was completely at a loss for words. It felt as if a huge stone was pressing on her chest, making it too heavy for her to open her mouth. She could only lower her head.

She knew Zhao Yixiao was right. Their lives were always uncontrollable because of their fluctuating health. She also knew that even if he didn't say it explicitly, he was referring not only to Luo Yiqiu, but also to herself.

But... she still didn't want to answer in the same way he said.

"Even if the people you think are holding you back are always doing it voluntarily, it doesn't change your mind, right?"

She choked up, her tone stubbornly unwilling to refute him.

She knew that she couldn't escape this topic now, so she could only hope that her words and attitude would change Zhao Yixiao's mind. But in fact, Shen Qingyun was also very clear in her heart that she knew Zhao Yixiao all too well what kind of person he was after knowing him for so many years.

Once he makes up his mind, there's no turning back. If even Luo Yiqiu can't do anything about it, then no one can.

At this moment, she held back the tears welling up in her eyes as she heard him, lying on the hospital bed, reply in a weak but firm voice, "Yes, this is my decision."

He closed his eyes, moved his lips slightly, and continued, "I'm sorry."

After apologizing, Zhao Yixiao finally couldn't bear it any longer and turned his head away.

He didn't originally intend to say these things at this moment, but he worried that if he didn't say them now, he might never have the chance again.

This time he didn't joke or speak. His thoughts were the same as his words: he didn't want to delay anyone, whether it was Luo Yiqiu or Shen Qingyun in front of him.

He couldn't give the girl in front of him the same amount of affection, even though he understood her and knew that she never wanted anything in return. They both knew each other too well, but even so, he shouldn't let this endless relationship continue.

Countless times, he wanted to break up this relationship, but Shen Qingyun subtly stopped him each time. She always said that they should just be friends, but if one day he left this world and someone suffered because of him, he would hate himself.

So, before any of this happens, let him be the villain. Whoever it is, they all deserve better.

Now, the atmosphere in the ward suddenly became extremely quiet because of his words. Shen Qingyun remained in the same position as before. She dared not raise her head, nor dared to look into Zhao Yixiao's eyes again.

She lowered her eyelids, letting the tears well up in her eyes and fall heavily to the ground. In her heart, it was as if a small storm had broken out, and a part of her heart was being swept away and collapsed by the wind and rain.

Even though she knew it was bound to happen sooner or later.

In the relationship between Zhao Yixiao and Luo Yiqiu, she was always the outsider who was isolated. She knew long ago that her feelings for him would end in vain. But when the person she liked so much told her this broken and cruel answer face to face, she still felt a pang in her heart, as if a needle was constantly pricking her.

His apology was like a summer rain, sudden and unpredictable, leaving one feeling powerless. He shouldn't have been the one apologizing, nor should he have been.

For a long time, Zhao Yixiao remained silent. In the silence, Shen Qingyun wiped her face before she could barely lift her head. She forced an ugly smile and said to him, "Yixiao, you don't need to apologize if you don't like me."

There's never an apology needed when you like someone; it's not his fault if he doesn't like her.

Over the years, she had had expectations and fantasies, and she once thought that as long as she tried hard enough, she could change his mind. But gradually, she found that she could be so powerless when it came to dealing with a person. If someone doesn't like you, they just don't like you, and no matter what she did, it was all in vain.

She had long known that all affection in this world was irrational.

...

The two people sitting outside the ward had no idea what was happening inside. Only after a long time did they see the ward door open, and Shen Qingyun called Luo Yiqiu in a muffled voice, saying that Zhao Yixiao had something to say to her.

Then, Shen Qingyun closed the door with red eyes. Shen Qingli noticed that something was wrong with her and was about to ask something when she spoke first: "Ali, I'll go and call a doctor to check on Yixiao."

“Okay…” She nodded blankly, and just as she was about to say something, she watched Shen Qingyun’s thin figure walk away into the distance.

She was now the only one left in the quiet corridor. She stood there blankly, somewhat confused about the situation, until she heard footsteps approaching and receding from a distance.

Shen Qingli looked in the direction of the voice and was surprised to find that it was Lin Xiaqing.

He was standing a few meters away from her, and he paused in his steps, probably noticing her gaze.

Across the hospital corridor, they looked at each other silently. Perhaps it was because of Zhao Yixiao's incident earlier that day that both of them were still shaken, but unusually, neither of them immediately avoided the other's gaze.

In the past, there were always people who dared not look each other in the eye, but now it felt like we had returned to the very beginning.

Shen Qingli looked at him, her gaze silently moving downwards, and when she saw the silver necklace he was still wearing around his neck, her eyes darkened.

She hadn't seen it when she came over, but she guessed that Lin Xiaqing had hurriedly pulled out the necklace, which was originally hidden under her collar, while she was busy.

She once had an identical necklace.

That necklace was bought by Charlene when they went to the market together. The story of the necklace comes from her.

When Shen Qingli was in the second year of junior high school, she saw a green necklace shaped like a pear at a stall. At that time, girls were just starting puberty and everyone loved to wear small things. They wore different colored jewelry on their necks and wrists. She had seen it once and wanted it very much afterward, but Grandma Shen thought it was too wasteful of money and did not agree to buy it for her.

She was secretly sad for a long time. Later, she didn't know how Xia Lin found out about it, but she promised Shen Qingli that she would give her this necklace as a New Year's gift.

But time waits for no one, and neither do things. Back at the stall, the pear necklace had already been bought, but Charlene didn't want her to be sad again, so she picked out two similar necklaces from the stall as New Year's gifts for the two of them, one for each of them.

Although she didn't receive the necklace she originally wanted, the one Charlene gave her was already very precious to her.

She really wanted it when she didn't have it, but once she actually got it, she couldn't bear to take it with her, afraid of bumping or damaging it. So she kept it safe at home, and later it was taken with her to her home in the city.

The first time she discovered that Lin Xiaqing was still wearing this necklace was on the afternoon he rushed out to fight. The sunlight fell on the silver necklace, and the reflected light hurt her eyes and made her nose sting.

But I haven't seen him wear it since, not even today.

Sometimes, Shen Qingli felt that the person in front of her was too contradictory and strange. He was clearly determined to let go of everything in the past, but now he still carried things from the past with him.

She couldn't understand him, but thankfully, she didn't need to try to understand him anymore.

-

Just as she was about to turn her head away, she heard Chen Chaoxi's voice from the side. She was carrying a large bag and was walking towards her, calling her over to help.

Shen Qingli responded and went over. After helping Chen Chaoxi carry the things to the ward door, Lin Xiaqing, who had been standing not far away, was no longer there.

Subsequently, Shen Qingyun arrived with the doctor, and Luo Yiqiu also came out of the ward.

They didn't know what the two of them had talked about in the ward, and Shen Qingyun didn't know whether Luo Yiqiu had gotten the answer she wanted in the end.

Neither she nor Chen Chaoxi dared to ask any questions.

After that day, Luo Yiqiu and Zhao Yixiao resumed their original way of getting along. They continued to appear on campus as a couple, as if the previous awkwardness had never happened.

All of this continued until Zhao Yixiao and his classmates finished their college entrance exams.

In the summer of 2014, Shen Qingyun and Zhao Yixiao finished their senior year of high school. Shen Qingyun applied to Suzhou University, the closest university to her home, and her mother chose a teacher training major for her.

She herself seemed to have no objection to this result, even though Shen Qingli knew that both the application for college and the choice of major were decided by her mother.

At the end of summer, Shen Qingyun received her admission letter from Suzhou University. Her university life was settled, but she didn't seem happy, nor sad. It wasn't until the end of summer that Shen Qingli realized that in the two years she had lived in Suzhou, she had never heard her older sister say a single word about what she liked.

That year, Zhao Yixiao applied to a university far from Suzhou, but no one knew which city he went to or where he was. Perhaps this was the result he wanted.

When asked about Luo Yiqiu again, she truthfully told everyone that she didn't know either. It was their agreement, and since Zhao Yixiao didn't want to tell her, she wouldn't actively search for his whereabouts anymore.

As that summer came to an end, Zhao Yixiao disappeared from everyone's lives, and also completely disappeared from Luo Yiqiu's life.

Their reconciliation was like a final burst of light before death, like a dream that could not be grasped once the dream ended.

In the early autumn of the same year, Shen Qingli and her classmates officially entered the most intense senior year of high school, and Luo Yiqiu no longer mentioned Zhao Yixiao.

Everything seems unchanged, yet everything seems to have changed.

They were pushed by time to the most tense moment of fate, and Zhao Yixiao was not the only one who left.

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Author's note: Don't apologize if you don't like it TT, and don't apologize if you do like it TT.

These chapters were really heartbreaking, but this is how the minor subplot ends ([bursting into tears]).