Chapter 31
When Song Yihuan finally returned to her home in the county town after a long and arduous journey, her anger was completely dispelled by the rickety van she was riding in on the return trip.
When she arrived at her doorstep, Ms. Wang was sitting in front of the door, clearly waiting for her.
She didn't even glance at Ms. Wang before rushing to the second-floor restroom and gagging against the toilet.
Ms. Wang quickly went up to the second floor and gently patted her back: "You must not have taken your stomach medicine on time. Why are you so nauseous?"
Song Yihuan didn't vomit anything. She scooped up a handful of water to rinse her mouth, took a deep breath after rinsing, and then exhaled.
"Give it back to me," Song Yihuan said as calmly as possible.
Ms. Wang ignored her and reached out to play with her pink hair. A few strands of sweat were damp on her face, which she gently brushed off.
"You're still weak. You've been sweating so much. I'll prescribe some more Chinese medicine for you tomorrow."
Let alone traditional Chinese medicine, I can't eat any food with a slightly strange taste. I have to vomit after drinking traditional Chinese medicine, which makes me feel bitter.
But there's no point in arguing with her about this now.
Song Yihuan patiently repeated, "Give me back my ID card."
"Why are you running around like that?" Ms. Wang was clearly a little angry. She frowned as she spoke, but then, remembering that the current policy was to appease her, she forced a smile. "Mom misses you. Isn't it good to be at home? You can eat and sleep at your own pace."
Sometimes there is a "noon" period, which refers to a more rigorous schedule than junior high school military training.
"Don't do this," Song Yihuan said softly, taking a deep breath.
"Mom didn't do anything wrong, and she didn't get angry with you. We're talking this out nicely..."
"The more you act like this, the angrier I get!"
Song Yihuan turned and ran back to her bedroom, saying before closing the door, "A temporary ID card can be issued in a day, I still have to leave."
She slammed the door shut with a loud bang, so loud that even the dog in the neighboring yard started barking.
/
"Why has it taken so long? Are we still going to rehearse?"
When Song Yihuan received Chi Ran's deliberately fierce voice message, she was pouring scalding hot Chinese medicine into the honeysuckle pot by the door. The flower was so watered that it started to lose leaves, and she estimated that it would die in a few days.
She poured the sauce in front of Ms. Wang, but Ms. Wang pretended not to see it and continued to fry it for the next meal. Ms. Wang set up a charcoal brazier and a ceramic stove, sitting in the yard and never leaving her side, frying it for her three meals a day.
Ms. Wang was decocting the medicine right below her bedroom window, so she could see it just by looking down.
Seeing it won't help; I won't drink it even if I see it, I'd rather die than drink it.
The local police station is inefficient; it takes four working days to process a temporary identity, including two weekend days, so you have to wait five days.
She searched the entire house thoroughly but couldn't find her ID card. She figured it wouldn't be found for at least five days, so she patiently waited.
Ms. Wang still spoke to her so cautiously, which made Song Yihuan afraid to lose her temper with her. Ms. Wang had been crying a lot lately, and she was especially afraid of Ms. Wang crying.
After all, Ms. Wang didn't shed a single tear from the time her father fell ill until his funeral.
She had no choice but to suppress her anger, and every day she would suffer from the honeysuckle because of her frustration.
After listening to Chi Ran's fierce voice message, Song Yihuan felt a little better and less frustrated.
She basked in the warm sunshine and replied to him with a voice message: "I'll be back for rehearsal on Tuesday."
"Too late, you're fired." Chi Ran's voice was languid.
"You think you can control everything?" Song Yihuan was unreasonable, but she was very confident and replied, "After you revised this version, it's too high and has no breath support. If you fire me, who can sing it?"
Chi Ran's voice message was filled with a warm smile: "What's it to you? I'm playing the erhu."
Song Yihuan listened to the last message twice and asked him, "Are you sunbathing too?"
Chi Ran was clearly startled by her "all-seeing eye" and sent a voice message: "Huh? Did I accidentally send you a video?"
No.
He asked, "Did you go home to learn fortune telling?"
"...No, you can hear Qian Yu shouting 'I'm dying of heat' in your last voice message."
Chi Ran chuckled softly a few times.
Song Yihuan asked, "Why is it so noisy? Where did you go?"
“The park,” Chi Ran said. “I still have your hiking stick with me.”
"Teacher Chi is amazing! There are so many people in the park!"
"Music festivals have even more people, so we have to get used to it in advance," Chi Ran said lazily, his voice carrying a sunny tone.
Song Yihuan tilted her head, her ear pressed against the phone, "There will be even more people at the train station. I'll arrive at 5 PM on Tuesday!"
"Stop acting all cute, I'm not picking you up. If I go to pick you up, people will trample you to death." Chi Ran quickly refused.
"...If you don't want to answer, then don't answer."
After hanging up the phone, Song Yihuan sat in the yard, squinting her eyes and comfortably basking in the sun.
My phone vibrated twice; it must be a text message.
She squinted and sat up; the screen was black under the bright sunlight and she couldn't see it clearly.
She got up and walked into the house. Ms. Wang was standing next to the square wooden table kneading dough. That evening, she would eat small mushroom and chicken wontons with almost no filling.
When she walked in, Ms. Wang looked up at her a few times.
"What's wrong?" Song Yihuan asked. "Should I wrap it with you?"
Ms. Wang didn't say no, and buried herself in making wontons.
She didn't insist and went back to her room upstairs, feeling a sharp pain drilling into her bones.
Song Yihuan wasn't very sensitive to pain. She didn't feel much pain when getting injections, blood draws, or having wires inserted, but cancer pain was really unbearable.
She took painkillers in the morning, controlling the dosage; she usually only takes the maximum dose when the pain becomes unbearable. Painkiller resistance is much more dangerous than other medications.
After much hesitation, she decided to take another pill and swallow it with warm water from her bedside.
She leaned against the bedside, waiting to be enveloped by the dizzying sensation that followed the onset of the illness.
The phone rang again, and judging from the sound, it was another text message. She stretched out her arm and picked up the phone.
If I don't watch it soon, I'll fall asleep.
The latest one was an advertisement, so she exited and clicked on the first one.
You have already purchased a ticket for train G329, please...
She tightened her grip on the phone, her thumb digging into the volume buttons.
She didn't buy the high-speed rail ticket; the destination was the capital.
She had no recollection of the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, the flag-raising ceremony at the Bird's Nest, or the Badaling Great Wall, all major landmarks in the capital. She had visited them all, but had no memory of them.
All she remembered was a brand-new, spacious laboratory ward in a top-tier hospital.
What impressed me most was the silver-gray double door of the laboratory ward, which looked remarkably like the door to an operating room. Every time someone went in or out, the double door would swing for a long time before slowly settling down.
She counted the number of times the door swayed each time, which was similar to some kind of alternative emotional control method.
The door stopped, and the physical and psychological pain came to a temporary end.
The sound of the door opening made her heart tighten, but the swaying sound gradually calmed her down, giving her a sense that the antidote would be available within three steps.
Song Yihuan leaned against the headboard and took several deep breaths, but still couldn't resist rushing downstairs.
The phone slipped from my grasp and fell through the gap in the stairs, hitting the ground with the faint sound of the screen shattering.
"It's alright, it's alright," Ms. Wang's voice quickly rang out, followed by the sound of washing hands. "I'll buy you one later..."
Where can I buy it?
Song Yihuan stepped onto the last step, her foot slightly unsteady, and her voice trembled: "In that shopping mall next to the Capital Hospital?"
Ms. Wang had her back to her, and the sound of rushing water was loud; she didn't say anything.
"You heard it! You clearly heard it!!"
Song Yihuan picked up her phone and slammed it on the table with a loud bang, sending shards of the screen flying everywhere.
"Don't be angry, Mom will talk to you nicely."
Ms. Wang turned off the tap and sat down, leaning against the square wooden table.
"Why didn't you talk to me properly when you hid my ID card and bought the high-speed rail ticket?" Song Yihuan, whose lower back and legs were in excruciating pain, also sat down at the table, diagonally opposite Ms. Wang.
"You wouldn't agree even if I told you."
“Whether I agree or not, I have to go, right?” Song Yihuan said. “I should have reported this one lost when I applied for my temporary ID card.”
"That's not what I meant. Mom just hasn't figured out how to persuade you..."
Ms. Wang was stirring the mushroom and meat filling with her head down. Song Yihuan could see clearly that there were several pieces of screen fragments inside, which she was mixing into the meat.
"I'm leaving next Tuesday no matter what, I'm definitely not going to the hospital." Song Yihuan became increasingly out of control as she spoke. "Go ahead and tie me up and take me to the hospital! This is a society governed by law, so go ahead and tie me up and send me there!"
"Don't...don't get so agitated, listen to Mom." Ms. Wang stirred the minced meat repeatedly. "Medical technology has also advanced recently. I asked Director Li beforehand, and he said it's immunotherapy..."
Song Yihuan interrupted her: "Haven't I used immunotherapy before?"
"Back then and now..."
"A year! Three hundred and sixty-five days!" Song Yi hysterically collapsed, "No matter how advanced the technology becomes, can it cure late-stage cancer??? Can it cure cancers that aren't even listed in cancer guidelines???"
"You don't believe me, but you don't believe Director Li either?" Ms. Wang put down her chopsticks and went to check her WeChat on her phone. "Let me show you, Director Li himself told me that immunotherapy is progressing, and yours..."
Song Yihuan pushed her phone aside. She didn't even need to look at it; she could already guess what Director Li was going to say.
She had never even heard of the term palliative care before; it was Director Li who told her about it.
She secretly saved up a few dozen pills and tucked them into the cracks of her drawer. Every night, she would glance at the pills and then at the body donation consent form she had filled out on her phone.
You can die anytime you want.
She used this terrifying thought as her guide to get through night after night.
One evening, as usual, she opened the drawer to check on her medicine, only to find it empty.
She rushed out in a panic, only to meet Director Li's indifferent yet infuriating eyes.
Director Li watched her silently as she continued to hit and punch him. Once she calmed down, he took out a pink, afro-haired ugly doll from his office.
"You got this from McDonald's, and I gave it to you to play with?"
She grabbed the doll's pink hair and tossed it aside. "Do you play with whatever you're missing?"
Director Li disregarded her offense and explained the concept of palliative care to her for the first time.
"If I had any medical research spirit, I shouldn't be telling you this. Your value is too great for both modern medicine and future patients. But little sister, you're an adult now, and I have to tell you some damn truths."
“Me, my teacher, and all those people who came to consult us time and time again, none of them are anything.”
“Little sister, you’re eighteen, that age is too…too damn old. If you were any younger, any less sensible, or any older, any more experienced, you wouldn’t be so…damaged. We’re here discussing your significance to the medical field, your significance to the biological field, necessary but cold-blooded…cold-blooded but necessary.”
"Little sister, there is only one way to die, but there are a thousand ways to live."
"I believe you want to live."
...
Song Yihuan could guess what was going on—Ms. Wang kept asking Director Li to treat her, so what could Director Li say? Should he tell her not to treat her?
Song Yihuan asked softly, "Do you still think to this day that I chose palliative care because I didn't want to live?"
"Don't talk nonsense, what do you mean by 'alive' or 'not alive'..." Ms. Wang's keen radar went off again, afraid that she would say something forbidden.
"Mother."
Song Yihuan looked up at her, her voice very soft, as if asking someone else, "Have I ever lived?"
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