26 White Lies
The sun peeked out from above the thick clouds, and a ray of sunlight suddenly penetrated into the bedroom, shining brightly on the bookshelf, almost blinding Zhang Chenling's eyes.
She walked over and carefully looked at the crystal trophy on the top layer. Her heart skipped a beat. It turned out that King B’s wife was Ni Yue’s favorite writer - Running to the Moon!
Thinking back to the way Ni Yue treated her like a god when she first mentioned Running Ball Sister to her, she thought this was a fatal blow to her.
Now, she was hiding in the toilet and hadn't come out for a long time. Zhang Chenling had no choice but to bite the bullet and explain to Sister Paoqiu and Aunt Shen: "Sorry to make fun of you, but even a strong man can't stand three poops. I guess she won't be able to come out for a while, so let's not wait!"
…
"The systolic pressure is 91, the diastolic pressure is 58. The blood pressure is slightly lower than the normal range. Other indicators are normal." Zhang Chenling said as she recorded.
The ball-running sister stared at Zhang Chenling intently, squeezing out a few words from her throat: "Can it be washed?"
All I could see was a longing for a hot bath.
Zhang Chenling comforted him, "It's not a big problem. We will try to control the bathing time to fifteen to twenty minutes. Just don't bathe for too long."
Previously, they learned from King B that Sister Paoqiu had been ill for three years and was currently in the middle stage of the disease. She had not yet developed the symptoms of breathing difficulties that would only occur in the late stage, so it was relatively safe to take a bath at this stage.
After putting away the testing equipment, she turned to Aunt Shen beside her and said, "I need to help her undress now. Would you be able to lend a hand?"
"Of course! You really can't do this job, I have to do it!"
Aunt Chen closed the bedroom door and pulled the curtains tightly, then walked to the bed, lifted the air-conditioning quilt, unbuttoned Sister Paoqiu's shirt one by one, then supported the back of her neck with her broad palm, and put her other arm in front of her chest, slowly lifting her upper body.
The ball-running sister's body was frail, her thin arms dangling limply, their joints seemingly frozen, held together by a thin layer of flesh. This resonated with Zhang Chenling's understanding: muscle atrophy and weakness in the upper and lower limbs is a symptom of quadrilateral ALS. Many patients are diagnosed with ALS after experiencing abnormal muscle twitching, difficulty lifting objects, or stumbling while walking.
But the next scene is terrifying
——I saw Aunt Chen slowly lay the upper body of the ball-running sister forward and let her lie limply on her legs, fitting almost perfectly.
It's like folding a quilt.
Zhang Chenling's hair stood on end.
"It's okay, we usually change clothes this way, it's easier than turning side to side!"
Aunt Chen gave Zhang Chenling a knowing smile, and skillfully took off the running girl's top from behind, revealing her bony back and a clear spine.
Then he slowly folded her back.
Zhang Chenling quickly reached out to cover the body of the ball-running sister with a bath towel, and Aunt Chen took off her pajamas and underwear with diapers stuck to them from under the bath towel.
Everything was ready. I opened the bedroom door and saw Xu Zhiqian standing there, looking puzzled. "Ni Yue is still in the bathroom! I knocked on the door, but she didn't say a word..."
Only when Sister Paoqiu's body slowly sank into the bathtub did Ni Yue quietly walk out of the bathroom.
Seeing her face flushed and her eyes swollen like walnuts, Xu Zhiqian blurted out: "Why are you..."
Before the word "cry" came out, Ni Yue choked him back with a big cross gesture.
"I have diarrhea!" She answered hoarsely, then took out a mask from her apron and put it on, not wanting Sister Paoqiu to see her miserable appearance.
"Wearing a mask to treat diarrhea?" Xu Zhiqian muttered softly.
Zhang Chenling smiled, secretly complaining that Ni Yue was too dramatic, then she began to act along, raising her chin to gesture for her to help wash her hair, "Sitting there is closer to the bathroom, so it's convenient for going to the toilet!"
In order to avoid suspicion from B Wang’s wife, Xu Zhiqian originally proposed to be a shampooer, but he did not expect to be a watering man at the last minute. He shrugged helplessly and had to obey the arrangement and sat on the other side of the bathtub, opposite Zhang Chenling.
The body of the ball-running sister absorbed moisture along with the large bath towel covering her. A blush slowly climbed up her bony cheeks and finally turned into fine beads of sweat on her forehead.
She said contentedly, "It's so comfortable."
The dry vocal cords seemed to be moistened by the water vapor and became smoother.
Hearing her words, Ni Yue's nose felt sore again, and two lines of tears flowed silently, and the mask soon became wet.
ALS, ASL, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, neurodegenerative diseases, the death of motor neurons in the brain and spinal cord, muscle atrophy and weakness...
All the medical terms that he had looked up before flew out one after another like a word screensaver of the Windows system, hitting Ni Yue's forehead.
But compared to those cold words, the appearance in front of me truly embodies the three words "ALS".
Except for her eyeballs, almost no part of her body could move freely. A young and beautiful soul was trapped in a decaying body. Even if it was an ordinary person, Ni Yue would feel sad, let alone she was the running girl.
It’s the running ball sister!
Ni Yue had devoured every novel written by Sister Paoqiu, and she knew every golden line by heart. Countless sleepless and lonely nights in her life were made less despairing by Sister Paoqiu's company...
In Ni Yue's previous imagination, Sister Paoqiu must be like the heroine in her writing, a typical modern Shanghai girl, passionate and unrestrained, daring to love and hate, and working hard every day: working, falling in love, having sex, fitness, traveling, cooking, writing... so vivid that everyone envies her.
But who could have imagined that in the real world, she was just a machine that had been scrapped prematurely - running to the moon? What a joke, she couldn't even crawl.
How can life be so absurd?
Ni Yue couldn't figure it out, silently shedding tears. His nostrils were soon blocked by the wet mask, and the feeling of suffocation became more and more intense. Finally, he had to get up and go to the bathroom to throw away the mask and blow his nose...
She sniffed and sat back on the small bench, but unexpectedly, the running ball sister raised her eyes.
Sure enough, I was shocked by that ugly crying face.
The running girl immediately understood something in her heart, but she didn't say anything and just swallowed her breath silently.
After a while, she looked up at Ni Yue again, her vocal cords trembling as she spoke a complete sentence with difficulty: "Which of my books do you like best?"
Ni Yue opened his red and swollen eyes wide, forced a smile and said, "This one is about love and night on Changle Road."
"Oh?" The ball-running sister was a little surprised.
"Ahem," Ni Yue coughed twice, turning his back, suppressing the turbulent emotions within. "Actually, I like all of your books, but the narrative techniques in this one are more sophisticated and experienced. I can't guess whether the heroine prefers the domineering CEO or the artistic guy. Although I personally prefer the domineering CEO, sometimes the domineering CEO makes people hate him so much that the artistic guy becomes more likable. This kind of uncertainty is the most unsettling. You've figured out the trick of buying stock articles!"
She paused, a pitiful smile forming on her lips, "But please don't spoil to me who the heroine chose in the end. I don't want to know."
A sly glint flashed in the ball-running sister's eyes. "I don't know either."
After a moment of silence, he asked Ni Yue, "Is your last name Ni?"
"Yes."
"Uncle Ni???"
"Yes!!!"
"Ha!" Sister Paoqiu smiled knowingly and said intermittently: "Uncle Ni...goddess...two wonderful things!"
Ni Yue was both sad and moved when she heard this. Fighting back tears, she asked, "How do you usually write? Do you use an eye tracker?"
"Hmm," the ball-running sister snorted, "I'll show you later."
At this time, Aunt Shen came over and reminded her, "You talk too much, take a break and then talk again!"
I'm actually used to typing with my eye tracker, which is faster than typing by hand. But I get uncomfortable sitting for too long, so I can only sit at the computer for two hours a day. To ensure the quality of the writing, I spend a day conceiving and drafting each chapter, and the next day revising and publishing it. That's just enough to keep up with the daily update schedule. On the rare occasions when I'm in a good mood, I'll save more drafts. Sometimes, I need to go to the hospital for a checkup, so I'll just ask for leave.
Sister Running Ball was wearing new pajamas and sitting in a wheelchair. She moved her eyeballs flexibly, relying on the infrared recognition of the eye tracker to control the virtual keyboard on the computer screen and typed out this text.
"So that's it!" Ni Yue sat next to her and had a human-computer dialogue with her.
It's funny to say, the first time I found out I was sick was three years ago when I was updating the book "The Rough Man Can't Stop". That day, the muscles in my right arm suddenly twitched violently, and then my hand cramped and I made typos for several days in a row. I thought it was overwork caused by typing too much, but then the situation became more and more serious - my feet started to become uncontrollable, and I tripped over myself several times at home, and my nose was bleeding, so my family took me to the hospital for examination, and finally an electromyography was done to confirm the diagnosis.
Ni Yue's heart twitched violently.
I was not yet thirty years old that year, and there were still many dreams in my life that had not been realized, many ideas that had not been written into novels, many restaurants that had not been checked in, many places that had not been traveled to, and King B and I had not yet married and had children... I was depressed for a long time, about three months, before I slowly accepted this fact.
Tears blurred my eyes unconsciously...
Oh no! Ni Yue's brows tightened, and he accidentally squeezed out a few golden beans. He quickly turned his face and wiped them away with the back of his hand. "You and King B weren't married at that time? Did you get the marriage certificate after you got sick?"
The ball-running sister took her eyes off the eye tracker and shook her head at Ni Yue with difficulty, "I haven't received it yet."
"Oh my God!" Ni Yue was shocked. "You are still boyfriend and girlfriend? But he always says you are his wife!"
We were college classmates and each other's first love. We had agreed to get married before we were 30, but I suddenly fell ill. His family didn't agree, and neither did mine. I didn't want to delay him, so I broke up with him many times. But he insisted on living with me and forced me to move from our home in Pudong to the upstairs of his tavern. He ran up and down the stairs every day to take care of me.
Ni Yue was dumbfounded. He didn't expect that King B was such an affectionate person?
You must be thinking that he is an affectionate man, right?
Seeing the question on the screen, Ni Yue and Running Ball Sister looked at each other and smiled.
In fact, I sometimes wonder if his actions, aside from love, might also be motivated by moral reasons. The first year his tavern opened, it was a quiet business. I accompanied him on his travels, exploring and learning, and I invested all my writing income, both royalties and royalties, into his tavern, using it to upgrade and improve its facilities. Only then did his business gradually improve. Therefore, his sense of responsibility and moral compass wouldn't allow him to leave me. In a way, I feel like he's even worse off than I am. I can just wait to die in silence, while he, not only must helplessly watch me die, but also constantly face the moral judgment from deep within. He suffers even more than I do... But whatever the reason, I'm truly grateful for his unwavering care for me.
This paragraph of text obviously consumed a lot of energy from Sister Paoqiu. She lowered her eyes to rest for a moment, then typed another line of words:
I wouldn't mind if he got a new girlfriend.
Ni Yue turned her head and read some insincerity in those deep eyes. She knew that the last sentence was somewhat embellished or self-consolation, not entirely sincere.
The emotions hidden behind the words, as tiny and subtle as a hair, could not escape Ni Yue's eyes. This is the tacit understanding cultivated after reading Sister Paoqiu's words for several years.
Sure enough, Sister Paoqiu quietly typed another line of words on the computer:
There must be a lot of pretty girls coming here every night to chat and drink, right?
The atmosphere is a bit subtle.
The image of the coquettish woman in a black tight skirt teasing King B flashed through Ni Yue's mind.
"Where are the pretty girls? B fans are mostly grown men. The girls in Shanghai are all so delicate. Who would stand on the side of the road and drink beer? You'll fill your belly with foam and car exhaust, and then come home bloated and farting. How uncomfortable!"
Without hesitation, she told a white lie.
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