Chapter 73

The infusion hall was quite crowded.

Guan Nan carried her takeout and a cup inside. Everywhere she looked, she saw elders, friends, and couples. At that moment, her gaze fell upon Jiang Li in the far corner.

She seemed to see herself alone in the green camphor tree, enduring countless trips to and from the hospital by herself.

Her colleagues and friends all have their own lives, and she doesn't like to trouble them or add to their burdens. So, she always makes sure everything is prepared for such occasions.

Wear a dress that's easy to go to the toilet, put a power bank in your canvas bag, and bring a light jacket.

A bottle of water and a piece of bread were enough to get through those few hours.

During those two years of starting her business, the pressure was immense. She stayed up all night, and her sense of responsibility was too strong. It felt like a knife was hanging over her head, ready to kill her at any moment.

She worked with the same energy she would have used for 28 hours in a day.

My hair is falling out in clumps, my arms are stiff and I can't use them, and my heart and breathing hurt.

She almost had to be hospitalized due to overwork, but she didn't tell anyone during that time. After the doctor's earnest advice, she bought a clothes hanger and went to the hospital for several days in a row.

This was a warning sign of a heart attack, and the doctor insisted that she be hospitalized for observation.

Guan Nan said, "I'm in the prime of my career and really can't be hospitalized; I can't get away."

"I can't stand you young people," the doctor said angrily. "Don't you know whether money or life is more important? Can you earn all the money in the world? You only have one life. If you lose your life, what will you earn?"

During that time, she didn't tell anyone, and nobody knew.

And so, in those lonely, silent nights, I gaze upon the happiness and fulfillment of family, friendship, and love.

She sat there looking so out of place.

I snapped out of my daze.

Guan Nan smirked and strode towards Jiang Li. When she heard the children pointing at him and talking, she would stop and carefully correct them: "Brother isn't alone. Sister just went to make medicine for him. Also, brother is wearing a mask because he has a cold. When you have a cold, coughing can spread bacteria and easily cause cross-infection. He'll need to get injections for a very long time to get better."

"Oh," the child said, seemingly understanding but not quite, turning to ask his mother, "Do I have to wear a mask too?"

The woman nodded and handed him a mask. He obediently put it on and then turned to greet Jiang Li, saying, "Brother, look, I'm wearing a mask too."

Jiang Li nodded upon seeing this.

Avoiding his gaze, Guan Nan opened the takeout bag, took out two bowls of porridge and side dishes, peeled back the lotus leaf covering the sticky rice chicken, handed him the spoon, and gestured for him to drink some porridge before eating the shumai.

She held a bowl of porridge and a sticky rice chicken, but Jiang Li just stared at her without moving.

Guan Nan hesitated, then tentatively asked, "Don't you have an appetite? I added sugar. Why don't you eat a couple of bites first? You still need to take your medicine later."

But Jiang Li just stared at her in silence.

Guan Nan looked up and saw that the IV drip was almost a third full. If she didn't eat something soon, the medication would take effect and she would feel even worse. Her brows furrowed slightly, her worry written on her face: "Or is there anything you want to eat? I can go buy it for you."

Guan Nan wanted to say something to coax him.

His voice was a little hoarse, and he spoke softly and slowly, as if he was trying his best to restrain himself.

Jiang Li asked, "Who were you thinking about just now?"

"What?" Guan Nan was taken aback.

Jiang Li stared at her, as if trying to discern the truth in her expression, and finally said, "Never mind."

"······"

Changing the subject, Jiang Li asked, "Why isn't it Sprite?"

“No Sprite,” Guan Nan said sternly, her face tense. “Not now, and not in the future…”

At this point, Guan Nan paused, as if thinking of something, and her voice softened considerably when she spoke again: "Don't drink it anymore, it's bad for your health."

Jiang Liyi curled her lips, her pale face unable to conceal her arrogance: "You're not going to be with me, so why are you interfering so much?"

“I don’t care,” Guan Nan retorted, immediately blurting out, “Aren’t I in charge of you right now?”

“Oh,” Jiang Li nodded, then slowly and deliberately pressed his advantage, “What, you don’t care about me now, you don’t care about the future either?”

"······"

Without giving Guan Nan a chance to speak, Jiang Li continued, "You must have a lot of free time."

Time and again, it is ambiguous yet captivating.

Then, by confusing objective meaning with subjective consciousness, they completely skewed people's thinking.

In this way, each time she was made to reflect on whether she had actually done anything, or said or done anything that made people feel ambiguous or intimate.

Guan Nan was getting annoyed. "Jiang Li, be reasonable."

After a two-second silence, Jiang Li tilted his head lazily and said, "How am I being unreasonable?"

"······"

Jiang Li lowered his voice: "Or do you think I'm just an unreasonable, argumentative, domineering, and illogical person?"

"······"

"Um?"

"······"

Jiang Li raised a brow, the corner of his eye curling up coldly, the smile not reaching his eyes: "Weren't you very talkative? Now that I'm asking you to talk, why aren't you saying anything?"

The atmosphere remained tense, and neither of them uttered a word.

A moment later, Jiang Li bent down slightly, tucked the hair that fell across her cheek behind her ear with his hand, and gently touched the texture of her temple with his cool fingertips. His voice was deep and soft: "If you really have something to say, just say it to my face. We are all men. What kind of skill is it to always hide?"

This action is both aggressive and subtly ambiguous and disrespectful.

One of them bowed his head and bent over, while the other stood upright and held his head high, their postures and gazes perfectly aligned.

Just as Guan Nan was about to open her mouth...

Then, Jiang Li lowered his eyes and sat back down with a normal expression.

It was as if that moment was her hallucination.

The brief moment of bending down and talking did not disturb anyone. They adhered to the basic requirements of public places, quietly eating, drinking medicine, and changing IV drips.

Whether it was the effects of the drug or not, Jiang Li fell asleep sitting up, quiet and eccentric with no aggression whatsoever.

But why couldn't I have a proper conversation with this person after we met again? Every word I said was barbed and sarcastic.

It wasn't exactly unpleasant to hear, nor was it particularly unpleasant, but it felt awkward and irritating.

The air conditioner was set too low, and the wind was blowing like it was free. Guan Nan was getting a little cold from the wind, and he was worried that he would catch a cold if he continued like this.

She silently took out her coat from her bag and carefully covered Jiang Li with it.

For a whole week, after Guan Nan finished work and returned to Cangyuan, he could always be seen sitting on a bench not far from the grocery store, calmly staring at the pomegranate tree.

Guan Nan walked over, and he slowly got up, raising his chin to indicate that she should call a taxi.

And so, the tacit understanding between the two lasted for a whole week.

Jiang Li asked her to accompany him without any hesitation, made her take a taxi without any sense of propriety, ordered food and made demands without any politeness, and picked and chose a seat without any consideration.

Guan Nan went along with him.

······

These past few days, Guan Nan hasn't been filming on location; she's mostly stayed in the studio, organizing beauty-related materials and products. She also cleaned up Zhang Hong's videos, leaving more space for advertisements.

However, the fact that this workaholic suddenly became eager to leave work surprised his colleagues in the studio.

"Guan Nan, you're not dating anyone, are you?" Xie Qiao asked mysteriously.

Guan Nan, who had just turned off the computer screen, paused while tidying up her things and turned to look at her: "No."

Xie Qiao: "Then why are you so eager to leave work?"

Zhang Min laughed along, "He must be in a hurry to go on his date."

Guan Nan's eyelids twitched upon hearing this, thinking that the other party was implying that she was slacking off at work, and she quickly shook her head: "Really not, I just have something to do and have to go first, I will finish the work."

“I can testify to this,” said Xiao Shuwei, who was working on the other side. “Her computer has been running every night for the past few days.”

At this point, Xiao Shuwei also teased her, saying, "Since you're going to be on a long journey anyway if you go back early, why not work overtime before you leave? At least you can get some overtime pay while you're sitting here."

“Yes, yes,” Zhang Min said with a smile, “What could be more important than money?”

Guan Nan blushed at their words, "I really do have something to say."

"What's up?"

They couldn't get anything out of her, but they found it amusing to make her blush, so they let her go.

She has a good personality, can take a joke, and has no temper.

Her colleagues at the studio all like her.

Until the last day of the IV infusion, the two stood downstairs at Building 26.

As they were about to part, Guan Nan called out his name: "Jiang Li".

Jiang Li stopped and turned around.

She paused, then said with great concern, "Don't do that again."

"?"

"Otherwise, what if your girlfriend can't stand you anymore one day?"

"..." After a two-second silence, Jiang Li suddenly laughed out of anger, as if he found her words absurd. "What, you think you can stand me just because she can't? Otherwise, why don't you reluctantly take me in?"

"······"

"Sister, if you want to date a younger woman, just say so. Why beat around the bush?"

elder sister?

An old cow eating young grass...

He really did hold a grudge.

Guan Nan remained silent, wanting to remind him not to get too caught up in the role.

But I don't know where to begin.

It was unusually cramped.

After he finished speaking, Jiang Li no longer restrained himself, displaying his arrogant and domineering attitude as a spoiled brat:

"With a face like mine, where can't I find a girlfriend?"