if
"you say,"
Bang--
"Could this human world just be a stage for the gods?"
The world spun around me, and when I closed my eyes, all I saw was a white light. In a moment that seemed both incredibly short and incredibly long, I was enveloped in an endless silence. A violent impact struck, and my body slid uncontrollably to the side, only to be forced to stop by the sudden collision.
"Otherwise, why...why does my life resemble an utterly clichéd drama, solely designed to grab attention?"
As consciousness returned, the edge of the enormous black curtain in my field of vision was being gradually devoured by crimson, and beneath the sharp ringing in my ears was a faint, indistinct noise.
"Is our fate already predetermined, and all our struggles in vain?"
It hurts! My whole body aches.
Jiang Moyun seemed to hear a very faint sound in a daze. The car door next to her was pulled open, and a blinding white appeared in her vision. She tried to look up, but she completely lost consciousness.
"If that's really the case, could you please let me be rejected by the gods sooner, and grant me a final curtain call?"
...
It sounded like someone was crying in her ear. Jiang Moyun struggled to open her eyes and looked at Lin Xihui, who was standing blankly to the side.
That's great, Xi Hui is alright.
She tried to comfort him and tell him not to cry, but she lost consciousness again in the next instant.
...
"Mo Yun, you're awake."
Jiang Moyun slowly opened her eyes. Before her was a clean white ceiling, and the air was filled with the smell of disinfectant. She heard familiar voices and the even, gentle "beep" sound.
"Am I...in a hospital?"
"Hmm, are you feeling better? Is anything bothering you?"
Jiang Moyun tilted her head slightly and saw Lin Bairan's bloodshot eyes. He looked extremely haggard, his hair was messy, he had stubble on his lips, and his clothes were wrinkled and crumpled, as if he hadn't had a proper rest in a long time.
She shook her head blankly, watching Lin Bairan get up and press the call button next to him, still a little confused about the situation.
Jiang Moyun then began to examine herself, and her breath caught in her throat—her left leg was suspended high in the air, covered with a thick cast. She subconsciously tried to move her left leg, but the person next to her saw through her act immediately.
Lin Bairan reached out and gently supported her, stopping her movement.
"I... I was in a car accident?" Jiang Moyun gradually recalled what happened before she lost consciousness. "Xi Hui, he..."
“He’s fine,” Lin Bairan continued, “He wasn’t in the car at the time, he wasn’t injured at all, it’s just…”
Lin Bairan sighed, seemingly wanting to say something but then stopping himself.
Just as Jiang Moyun was about to ask further questions, the doctor and nurses arrived. "The patient is awake, right? Is there anything wrong with him/her...?" Then they began a series of examinations.
She had just woken up and was still very tired. She fell asleep again shortly after the check-up.
Lin Bairan panicked when he saw her close her eyes again, but the doctor reassured him that this was normal and she would wake up later, which put his mind at ease. The doctor also instructed him to remember to moisten Jiang Moyun's lips with a cotton swab dipped in water.
"Yes, I've been remembering. Thank you for your help, doctor." After the doctor left, Lin Bairan slumped into a chair and gently took Jiang Moyun's hand.
He couldn't help but look at Jiang Moyun's left leg, which was suspended high in the air, and he had lost count of how many times he had felt powerless.
What should we do?
How can I tell you... that you might... not be able to dance anymore?
——
Two days ago.
"Dad, there's an emergency at the company, I have to go there first. I'll call the driver and have him bring another car to pick you up." Ci Qing answered the phone and hurriedly prepared to leave.
"I'll take you. I'll also go check on how my experimental project is going." He had been too restless all day, and he was worried that something might happen. He didn't want Ciqing to go alone.
They rushed to the company. Ciqing went to a meeting, while he went to the R&D department to discuss improvement plans with his assistant. Not long after, Ciqing's secretary came running over in a hurry. She was always composed; they wondered what urgent matter had occurred.
Lin Bairan gestured for his assistant to pause, then put down the documents in his hand. "Has something gone wrong with the collaboration?"
The secretary shook her head. She hadn't even caught her breath from running all the way here, and hurriedly said, "President Lin, the driver called and said that Chairman Jiang was in a car accident and is currently being treated at the Second People's Hospital."
"What?" Lin Bairan could hardly believe his ears. He hadn't even had time to take off his lab coat before he rushed out.
"Mr. Lin, please calm down. I've already had the car parked at the entrance. You're not in a good condition to drive right now."
His assistant followed and took off his lab coat. "Professor, please calm down. Your wife will definitely be alright."
Lin Bairan didn't bother to answer and got into the car in a daze.
The secretary, following beside her, was still chattering away—"President Jiang's meeting is almost over. I've already arranged for someone to wait outside and notify her as soon as they come out. The car is also ready. If the meeting hasn't ended in 20 minutes, I'll have someone go in directly to inform President Jiang..."
Lin Bairan was no longer listening to anything. In his extreme panic, he began to drift off into a daze, and everything around him felt unreal.
"The drive seems a bit rough today," he thought to himself, staring blankly out the window as the shops and pedestrians on the street receded evenly into the distance.
Suddenly, I tasted a metallic taste of blood in my mouth.
Looking down, I realized that my finger had been put to my lips at some point, and it was unconsciously being bitten, causing tiny beads of blood to seep out.
He put his finger in his mouth, wiped away the blood droplets, and felt a slight tremor in his lips.
"Oh, it was me shaking." Lin Bairan's attention shifted elsewhere.
"I heard that a car suddenly went out of control and crashed into us. Fortunately, neither the young master nor the driver were in the car at the time, so they were unharmed. We'll have to wait until we see the surveillance footage to know the specifics. The young master went to the hospital with the ambulance, while the driver stayed at the accident site to coordinate with the insurance company and the traffic police..." The secretary continued to dutifully report the situation to him.
Lin Bairan caught the key words, and his stagnant thoughts finally began to flow slowly again. "Xi Hui wasn't in the car... Luckily, Xi Hui is alright... Everyone else is alright... Only my Mo Yun, Mo Yun is still being rescued." He couldn't help but tremble again, and he pulled at the tiny wound on his fingertip with his teeth as if he were harming himself, feeling the blood gushing out continuously. It seemed that only the dense taste of blood and the fine pain between his lips and teeth could calm him down.
The perception of time is distorted.
It seemed like a long time had passed, yet it also felt like just a blink of an eye... The car smoothly came to a stop at the hospital entrance. Before his mind could process what he was doing, Lin Bairan had already gotten out of the car and was about to walk away when he suddenly stopped.
Lin Bairan gazed at the crowds coming and going before him, feeling utterly bewildered—children with IV drips were crying incessantly, their parents either holding or carrying them, but their faces were filled with helpless exhaustion and heartache, as well as varying degrees of irritation; the elderly in wheelchairs were mostly crooked, their mouths slightly open uttering indistinct murmurs, their withered and wrinkled fingers trembling weakly in the air, being slowly pushed into different buildings amidst the silence or perfunctory responses of those behind them…
Lin Bairan was led by his secretary into one of the many similar white buildings, and was pushed into a spacious but empty elevator by the flow of people.
The crowd silently filled the cavity of this cold, steel structure, compressing inwards amidst the occasional "Make way," "Thank you," and "Sorry," making the air, which smelled of disinfectant, seem thinner.
Then, under everyone's watchful eyes, the giant box that had swallowed dozens of people slowly closed its doors, sank slightly, and began to slowly rise—very slowly, stopping at almost every floor. People gradually left, and new people immediately squeezed in.
When the elevator doors opened for the second time, Lin Bairan felt a slight tugging at his cuff. Since it was inconvenient to speak, he saw his secretary gesture for him to walk out.
He silently followed, leaving the oppressive space, where the air began to circulate again. After a few steps, he couldn't help but look back, only to find that the elevator that had been going up had already closed its doors and headed to the next floor.
He turned his gaze forward again. Several medical staff pushed a cart past him in a hurry. The people in the cart had their eyes closed, their mouths and noses covered with breathing masks, and their bodies were covered with a white blanket. They just passed by him like that.
Lin Bairan arrived at the operating room door and saw Lin Xihui's thin figure shrouded in the glaring red light of the operating room entrance. He stood silently to the side as well. His arrival only made Lin Xihui slightly raise her eyes, and then the two of them began to wait helplessly together.
Time continued to pass, and in the agonizing wait, it felt as if an invisible hand was gripping his neck and tightening little by little. Lin Bairan felt himself being suffocated.
The red light was still on in another operating room not far away, but a doctor came out of it. A crowd of people rushed up to him, and amidst their anxious expressions and muffled voices, Lin Bairan saw the doctor silently shake his head.
After an eerie silence, a profound sorrow filled the air.
Lin Bairan forced himself to look away and couldn't help but start pacing, trying to get rid of the suffocating feeling that followed him like a shadow. The wounds on his fingertips, which had already scabbed over, bled again under the relentless pressure, and a dull pain surged up.
The hands on his wristwatch turned faithfully and continuously. He couldn't help but turn to look at Lin Xihui, only to find that he had become a hunched and silent sculpture, slowly decaying in the dead silence of waiting.
In her daze, she heard hurried footsteps; it was Jiang Ciqing. She stopped abruptly in front of the operating room door, tears streaming down her face. After glancing around, she rushed towards Lin Bairan, grabbed his arm tightly, and her voice trembled with barely suppressed sobs and anxiety, "Dad, how is Mom? What did the doctor say?"
The word "Dad" jolted Lin Bairan back to his senses, jolting him awake from his daze. As the dreamlike confusion faded, the unbearable worry became clear. Lin Bairan forced himself to cheer up, gently hugged Jiang Ciqing, and patted her back to comfort her, "Don't worry, everything will be alright."
At this point, all we can do is pray that this feeble comfort doesn't turn into a sad lie.
Jiang Ciqing was not a weak person to begin with, and after being comforted, she gradually calmed down. She then walked over to Lin Xihui, who had been standing to the side for a long time, took his hand and examined him carefully from head to toe, while Lin Xihui was just like a puppet being manipulated by her.
He kept his head down, his face expressionless, except for a few twitches when Jiang Ciqing hugged him tightly, as if he wanted to hug her back, but before he could make any further move, Jiang Ciqing had already let go of him. "Luckily you're alright. Don't blame yourself too much, it's not your fault."
The anger that had been building up in Lin Xihui's eyes during the hug suddenly vanished. He opened his mouth, perhaps wanting to say something. Suddenly, the operating room doors opened, drawing everyone's attention to the doctor emerging from within.
This scene, so similar to the one next door, made Lin Bairan feel as if his feet weighed a ton, but he still stepped forward first and asked the question everyone was concerned about but dared not face: "How... is the situation, doctor?"
The doctor sighed wearily, and Lin Bairan's heart clenched. But then she saw the doctor's eyes crinkle slightly, as if he were smiling behind his mask. "It's nothing serious. He can be transferred to a ward for observation after everything is completely finished. But..."
The tension that had just eased was immediately heightened by this shift in tone, and everyone held their breath, waiting for the doctor to continue.
"The patient's left knee suffered a severe injury, and the extent of the damage will depend on the subsequent recovery. However... it's practically impossible for it to return to its original level..."
"What specific impact will it have?" The doctor's words were abruptly interrupted by Lin Xihui, who had been silent all along. He clenched his fists tightly, his body tense, like a string on a musical instrument stretched too tight, ready to snap at any moment.
The doctor's face remained expressionless as he stated the facts straightforwardly: "The left leg cannot bear weight on one leg, and it hurts on rainy days, etc. These are common aftereffects. In addition... if you usually have hobbies such as sports or dance, you will most likely not be able to maintain them and will only be able to do some of the most basic and simple activities."
Lin Bairan's heart sank little by little with the doctor's words, and he saw Lin Xihui trembling slightly out of the corner of his eye.
The doctor then looked around at everyone again, his gaze finally settling on Lin Bairan, who appeared the most composed. "There are some post-operative precautions I need to explain. Who will take charge of them?"
Lin Bairan couldn't care less about his son for a moment and quickly stepped forward, saying, "Tell me."
The doctor nodded and began to explain the precautions to him.
The others didn't leave either, and listened attentively with him.
...
Lin Bairan watched as Jiang Moyun was wheeled into the ward, and then persuaded Ci Qing to return to the company, telling her to clean up the mess she had left behind when she left in such a hurry before coming back.
“It’s not good to just leave your partner there like that. The losses are secondary; your mother will worry about you when she finds out. There are people watching over things here. If you’re really worried, go and come back quickly.”
Ci Qing then left with her secretary, replying to the backlog of missed calls on her phone as she walked.
Lin Xihui's condition was not right, and Lin Bairan was worried about leaving him alone, so he called the driver and asked him to continue to deal with the insurance company and traffic police to handle the last few issues... After finally arranging everything, only he and Lin Xihui were left by Jiang Moyun's hospital bed, looking at each other in bewilderment.
During the recent call, Lin Bairan had already learned the whole story from the driver: Lin Xihui wanted to pick up the piano early, and because she was craving something sweet, they took a longer route home. The car was parked on the right side of the road; the driver and Lin Xihui got out to buy something, leaving only Jiang Moyun in the car. She sat in the back left seat for convenience. No one expected that in just over ten minutes, a car would come hurtling towards them. The driver was probably fatigued, losing consciousness for a few seconds while driving, his foot still on the accelerator, causing the steering wheel to veer off course and crash into the roadside. The speed was too high, and the violent impact dented the car quite a bit.
Natural disasters and man-made calamities are difficult to avoid.
Rationally, Lin Bairan knew that this wasn't Lin Xihui's fault, but her thoughts were out of control, and she couldn't help but keep making assumptions in her mind: "What if Xihui hadn't..."
"If not," these have almost become the four words Lin Bairan hates most in this world. The long and heavy regret cannot cross these four light syllables, and the simple 27 strokes are filled with the helplessness of the world.
Lin Bairan opened his mouth several times, but couldn't utter a single word of comfort.
Why?
Why did fate, with countless forks in the road, lead us down this particular path?
He made assumptions, deduced, and questioned repeatedly...
He could only fall into this deathly silence with Lin Xihui.
"Ding—" The sudden ringtone sounded, and Lin Bairan seemed to have finally found a breather. Without even looking at the contact, he hurriedly answered the call and left the ward.
Yu Guangli and Lin Xihui remained motionless, as if they had long since become a lifeless statue.
It wasn't an important call; it could be finished in a few words. Lin Bairan then stood back next to Lin Xihui.
He raised his hand to pat Lin Xihui's shoulder, "It's not your fault..."
Before she could finish speaking, Lin Xihui suddenly lost control, "It's all because of me..."
"It's all because I wanted to get the piano and buy things... otherwise this wouldn't have happened... Mom won't be able to dance anymore..."
"It's clearly...it's all my fault..."
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