Chapter 26
The corridor was bustling with people, and the figure from before was no longer there. Zhao Lin was still leaning on the balcony, his eyes fixed on the senior high school teaching building opposite.
Surrounded by the excited voices discussing weekend plans, he rubbed a small stone in his hand boredly.
"Brother Zhou, come to my house tonight and stay overnight?"
He Xu suddenly appeared from nowhere, put his arm around his shoulders, and laughed quite wildly.
"All night, does your sister agree?"
"I need her permission to stay up all night. Isn't that funny?"
Zhao Lin curled his lips and glanced at him, and with just one sentence, the arrogance around him disappeared by half.
He pushed off the shackles on his shoulders and turned to walk towards the classroom.
"Let's go together after school. I'll wait for you."
He Xu had finally made it to the weekend but he was not going to give up easily. He just saw Zhao Lin waving his hand, and he took it as her consent, snapped his fingers and went downstairs.
During the last two self-study classes, it seemed that the entire campus was getting restless. As the countdown to the bell rang, half of the students in the classroom had put on their backpacks.
Zhao Lin slowly packed up the books in his hands, picked out a few and put them into his bag.
"Why do I feel like there's something wrong with you, Brother Lin?"
He Xu looked at his listless appearance and said with a wicked smile: "It seems that I understand you. People who don't know would think that your soul has been seduced away by some girl."
"Stop talking nonsense."
Zhao Lin uncomfortably shook off the people around him and walked forward with his bag.
The two of them turned the alley one after the other and saw the boy and girl standing at the gate of the He family's courtyard from a distance.
"Oh my god, I'm so unlucky that I ran into a gun."
While He Xi was staring at the paper in his hand and hadn't noticed them, He Xu turned around and was about to run.
Zhao Lin ignored his gesture and continued walking forward with his eyelids drooping.
When they got closer, the three of them met face to face.
"You guys stayed late?"
He Xi asked in confusion when he saw that he had just returned. Then he heard the boy mumble a "hmm" and then went into the next yard.
She raised her eyebrows and looked away, unexpectedly meeting Jiang Yue's inquiring gaze.
"What's wrong?"
"When did you two become so familiar with each other?" His expression seemed a little too serious.
He Xi was puzzled by the question and resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "It's just a greeting, how familiar can we be?"
She stuffed the test paper back into Jiang Yue's hands and turned into the yard.
Separated by a wall, Zhao Lin waited until all the sound in the alley had died down before he walked to the recliner and sat down, curling his lips in self-mockery.
*
As the days passed, He Xi became more and more silent in his life of going back and forth between home and school.
Not long after the new semester started, Xiang Yuzhi applied to a school abroad, which was a route her family had already arranged.
At the beginning, the two of them calculated the time to upload the video, but as Xiang Yuzhi became more integrated, their communication became much less.
The winter solstice is approaching and the temperature is approaching below zero.
He Xi walked into the room, stomping his feet as he took off his cotton coat and scarf. Yan Runqing, who was standing beside him, kept shaking his head as he watched.
"Don't worry about taking it off. We're going out for a while. Your grandma Li will be discharged from the hospital today."
The old man couldn't sit still all day. One day he went out early to buy vegetables and was hit by a passing electric bike and fell down and was hospitalized.
"Take it back to the old yard?" she asked with a frown.
It takes a hundred days to heal a broken bone, and after leaving the hospital, you have to stay in bed to recuperate. Everyone in the alley knows about the situation at Grandma Li's house, not to mention that the news of Yang Jia's mother causing trouble in the hospital a few days ago has already spread like wildfire.
"Where else can I go?" Yan Runqing thought about it and felt helpless. "The old man has lived here for most of his life, where else can he go..."
He Xi listened to his mother talking about the old days with hesitation, put on his cotton coat silently, and took out the cell phone from his pocket.
It wasn’t too late on the weekend, but the gloomy weather made it look dim outside.
Yan Runqing packed up the handicraft work she had taken on temporarily, and the two of them rushed to the hospital.
Passing by Yang Jia's courtyard, He Xi heard someone next to him sigh and couldn't help but turn his head to glance.
"It's better if you and Yang Jia... have a distant relationship."
Someone next to her said something meaningful, and she pursed her lips and walked forward with her head down.
She would occasionally see Yang Jia and Zhuang Yufei at school, but she would avoid them whenever possible. The other two seemed to have reached a tacit understanding, ignoring each other whenever they saw each other.
She remembered that after returning home that day, she took a long time to reply to her message. She didn't mention leaving the house, but just said she couldn't go because of something.
The other party replied to the voice message immediately, with his usual casual tone amidst the mellow music.
That's it.
She wasn't good at getting angry, and making a scene wouldn't help. After all, the wounds that had been seared into her heart wouldn't heal easily.
He Xi had prepared himself mentally before entering the ward, but he still couldn't help feeling sad when he saw the old man lying on the hospital bed who had become thinner.
Grandma Li was awake, looking frail but still in good spirits. She couldn't help but smile when she saw them come in.
After greeting, while the adults were talking, He Xi glanced at the boy who was quietly packing his things.
"Shall we go straight back to the old courtyard later? My mom and I can help you with anything."
She took a few steps closer, lowering her voice deliberately. Her gaze fell on Zhao Lin, and she could clearly see the dark circles under his eyes.
"It's more convenient to go to my place. The old lady is stubborn and I can only do it without telling her first and ask for permission later."
There weren't many daily necessities brought with them, so she helped pack them up. Zhao Lin finally went to complete the discharge procedures, and they pushed Grandma Li's wheelchair out together.
The car that was called in advance stopped downstairs of the inpatient department. He Xi looked at the old man who was coaxed by his mother all the way, and he realized it a little belatedly.
"Did you agree with my mother to cooperate?"
Before getting in the car, she grabbed Zhao Lin's sleeve and leaned close to him, whispering.
The boy was a little overwhelmed by her sudden approach, and touched his nose awkwardly with red ears.
"Well, so don't give yourself away."
She responded softly, watching the man bustling about in front of her, somewhat lost in thought. She didn't know when it started, but she felt that this man had become much easier to talk to.
Yan Runqing chatted with the old lady along the way, and the atmosphere in the car was quite cheerful.
The two people's topics ranged from hospital conditions to physical care, and finally they inevitably recalled the past.
"Back then, we couldn't afford to see a doctor if we got sick. Even having a child depended on luck. I remember when I gave birth to Yuanyuan's mother, it was around the winter solstice. It was freezing cold and it was unbearable."
"Later, when Yingying got married, I repeatedly told her to choose a good date, but she turned a deaf ear to me. She spent her confinement alone in the middle of winter, carelessly and ended up with a lot of illnesses..."
He Xi pricked up his ears, his eyes involuntarily cast on the person next to him. The boy's eyes were lowered and his expression could not be seen clearly.
She had seen Zhao Lin's mother in her father's high school graduation photo. His eyebrows and eyes looked very much like the young girl in the photo.
Grandma Li choked up as she spoke, and her mother held her thin hand and tried her best to comfort her.
She stared at the person next to her for a long time, but never spoke.
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