Chapter 8: Memory Loss
Gu Ningwei did not send her to the subway station, but insisted on sending Han Que to a place near her home.
It was one of the few old and dilapidated alleys in the city. It was narrow and cramped, dark and gloomy, with the dim glow of street lamps only visible from a long distance away.
His luxury car couldn't drive in, so he had to park at the entrance of the alley.
However, Han repeatedly explained to him that she had walked this alley since she was a child and it was very safe, so she stopped Gu Ningwei from walking her.
But he still got out of the car, stood across from her, and clicked on his WeChat QR code. "Add me. Send me a message when you get home to let me know you're safe."
Han hesitated, then stood there without moving.
Gu Ningwei laughed again and teased her deliberately: "It's not like you can't delete someone just because you added them on WeChat."
He hit the nail on the head, but Han opened his phone awkwardly, scanned Gu Ningwei's WeChat QR code, and accepted the other party's friend request. Gu Ningwei seemed relieved and breathed a sigh of relief.
"Goodbye, it's nice to meet you. Let's have dinner together next time we have the chance," said Gu Ningwei.
"Goodbye, thank you." Han nodded, then turned and walked into the dark alley.
The "next time" and "there will be a chance" from adults are just perfunctory empty promises and should not be taken seriously.
After walking a few steps, the car lights behind her suddenly lit up, illuminating the alley directly. She paused, a slight warmth passing through her heart, then turned around and waved in the direction of the light.
Han Que entered the room. Liu Suping was still awake. She was sitting by the bed, washing her feet. She looked up at Han Que and frowned, complaining, "Why are you so late?"
Han put down the canvas bag on his shoulder and said weakly, "Overtime."
Lu Xiaoping was originally her client, and he was working overtime today.
Liu Suping stopped asking questions and just lowered her head to wipe the soles of her feet vigorously with a towel. After wiping a few times, she felt it was not enough, so she reached over and took the ox horn scraper from the bedside and scraped the soles of her feet vigorously.
Han watched her movements and shrank back as if he was ticklish.
Her mouth was dry. She turned around and picked up the bamboo water bottle on the table. She shook it and found that the bottle was empty. She sighed slightly and said, "Mom, you have used up all the water in the bottle again."
"Didn't you say I shouldn't light the stove?" Liu Suping answered straightforwardly without even raising her head.
Han didn't say anything else. He picked up the bottle of water and went to the small kitchen next door. He fumbled under the flowerpot on the windowsill and used a small key to open the padlock on the door.
She turned on the light switch and the house came on, illuminating the illegal kitchen which was about two square meters in size.
The wall was built with red bricks and covered with a few asbestos tiles, which could barely keep out the wind and rain. A gas stove was placed on a cement platform also made of bricks. It was black and greasy, and there were traces of smoke and fire everywhere.
Half of the wall panel was burned black, but Han stared at it for a long time before going to the faucet of the open-air sink outside, filling the kettle with water, carrying the kettle back into the kitchen, putting the kettle on, and lighting the gas.
The person stood in front of it, with a blank expression, watching the blue flame lick the black bottom of the pot with its tongue.
She had just cleaned the kettle and pots at home until they were sparkling clean on Sunday, but just two days later, Liu Suping burned the kettle again.
I don’t know how many times this has happened.
In the past two years, Liu Suping's memory has obviously declined. When she is alone at home, she either forgets to turn off the fire or the water. However, Han received several calls from neighbors while at work. When he returned home, he either saw water flowing all over the floor or a mess.
"Han Que, your mother isn't acting right. You need to take her to the hospital to see a doctor," Grandma Jiang from next door whispered to her. "I'm over 80 years old, and I don't have the memory loss she does."
"My mother just has a bad memory, what's the problem?" Han said coldly.
"Oh, this isn't just a bad memory. There's something wrong here." Grandma Jiang pointed to her forehead. Ignoring Han Que's suddenly dark face, she continued, "I told you not to be angry. Ever since your father passed away, your mother hasn't been right."
Han frowned and looked at Grandma Jiang, listening to her continue muttering, "She can't do this. Look, this is an old house. The plumbing and electrical wiring are already outdated. What if she forgets to light a fire one day, and you're not home, and we don't notice it? If this wooden house catches fire, it will be terrible. It will cost lives... You can't take it lightly."
Han was unhappy and deliberately choked her: "This house is old and dilapidated. Why don't you live with your son and grandson and enjoy a peaceful life?"
Grandma Jiang glanced at her, pursed her lips, and turned away.
Han stood there, looking at the burnt black wooden wall panels, and couldn't help but feel shocked.
There was indeed something wrong with Liu Suping's condition. She was only fifty years old, but her memory was not as good as Grandma Jiang's.
She remembered a movie called "The Eraser", which showed that young people can also suffer from Alzheimer's disease.
No one could explain medical matters clearly, but Han was really scared.
She tried to test Liu Suping in a roundabout way and found that her memory was really confused. She spoke sometimes clearly and sometimes incoherently.
She didn't dare take Liu Suping to the brain hospital to see a doctor, but just looked up the relevant symptoms on the Internet. The more she looked, the more frightened she became. Finally, she couldn't help but secretly ran to the brain hospital for consultation.
The doctor said that the patient had not undergone a brain scan and no conclusion could be drawn, but based on Han Que's description, Liu Suping might have brain atrophy.
"You still have to bring her in for a checkup so we can make a correct diagnosis," the doctor said.
"What if it is diagnosed as Alzheimer's disease? Is there a cure?" Han did not give up.
The doctor looked up at her and shook his head slightly.
"So far, there's no proven effective medical treatment. All treatments are symptomatic." He glanced at Han Que's beautiful, sorrowful face, feeling sorry for her. He whispered comfortingly, "But your mother is young. Perhaps symptomatic treatment will yield better results. You should still bring her here. Besides, we can't jump to conclusions right now. This needs to be diagnosed by the woman herself."
Han lowered his head and said, "I'll try my best."
After a moment of silence, she continued in a lower voice, "It's precisely because she's young that she can't face it."
After going to the brain hospital, Han was still unwilling to give up, so he went to find Fang Jiayan and asked her to find a way to ask an expert. After Fang Jiayan asked, the expert's answer was basically the same.
"Han Que, you are a biology student yourself, so I don't need to explain this to you..." Fang Jiayan said, sighed heavily, and patted her shoulder, but she couldn't say much to comfort her.
The water boiled, and steam blew in her face, wetting Han Que's hair on her forehead and ruffling her cheeks, making them wet as if she were crying.
In fact, she rarely cries now, as all her tears were shed that year.
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