Chapter 76
Sure enough, less than five minutes later, Zhou Xinyi and Zhou Chengze rushed in from the next ward.
Zhou Chengze was the first to rush over, followed by Zhou Xinyi, who was pushing an IV drip bottle by herself.
Upon seeing Xiang Wan regain her senses, the two said in unison:
"A-Wan, you're awake!"
"Sister Xiang Wan..."
Realizing he had overstepped his bounds, Zhou Chengze quickly corrected himself: "Xiang Wan, you're awake."
The three looked at each other in bewilderment, while Chen Yan and his trio behind them watched them silently, none of them speaking first.
A month ago, when they discovered that Xiang Wan and Zhou Xinyi had fallen into the sea, they immediately reported it to the coast guard and searched for them along the route they had taken for a day.
Although it was overseas, the coast guard responded very quickly, and they searched and rescued together with the coast guard for a whole day.
Later, as darkness fell, everyone felt hopeless, but their yacht still didn't dock that night.
They searched all night, with the five of them taking turns in two shifts to keep an eye on the sea, but they still found nothing.
The following afternoon, just when everyone was in despair, Zhou Chengze received a phone call from an unknown number.
The caller said a lot, and at first he thought it was a scam call, until Zhou Xinyi grabbed the phone and called his name, and he realized that the two of them were still alive.
Zhou Xinyi was already at her limit and fell into a coma after receiving the call. When the foreigner took over the phone, Zhou Chengze asked him to call an ambulance and then asked for their exact location.
The group arrived at the shore shortly after boarding the yacht. Just as they arrived, the doctor was lifting the two people on the stretcher into the car.
Ambulances have a limited capacity, so Chen Yan went to the hospital with the ambulance, while Zhou Chengze and the trio waited for Wang Yidong and the others to come and pick them up.
When they met at the hospital, the doctor said that the two had some edema in their lungs and were dehydrated due to choking on water, but otherwise their bodily functions were basically normal. However, for some reason, they remained unconscious.
Zhou Xinyi is in a better position; she woke up a week ago, while Xiang Wan has been in a coma for a full month.
Actually, while waiting for Wang Yidong to come and pick them up, Zhou Chengze found the person who had called him and asked him. The foreigner also said that it was the girl who borrowed his phone to make the call who pulled another girl ashore.
However, for some unknown reason, Zhou Chengze always believed that Zhou Xinyi had pushed Xiang Wan into the sea.
The first thing he said to Zhou Xinyi when she woke up wasn't concern, but questioning.
Shen Feiyang and Che Nanbei, both girls, also had some reservations about this, finding Zhou Chengze's behavior somewhat inexplicable. However, since it was a matter between the siblings, they couldn't interfere.
In the days following Zhou Xinyi's awakening from her coma, they were the ones who stayed with her during her recovery.
Despite Zhou Xinyi's denial, Zhou Chengze still seemed unconvinced.
Now that Xiang Wan has woken up, the moment he sees her, he begins to subtly probe how she fell into the sea.
Behind them, Chen Yan and the trio were also waiting for Xiang Wan's answer. Although they didn't really think it had anything to do with Zhou Xinyi, they were still a little curious about how Xiang Wan had fallen into the sea.
Shen Feiyang also asked Zhou Xinyi, but she couldn't explain it either.
All eyes were on Xiang Wan, but Xiang Wan looked at Zhou Xinyi and said to the others, "I want to talk to Zhou Xinyi alone for a while."
The trio looked at each other in bewilderment. When they left, Jiang Zhuochun even dragged Zhou Chengze along with him.
Once only the two of them were left in the ward, Xiang Wan looked at Zhou Xinyi and smiled softly: "Thank you for saving me."
Upon hearing this, Zhou Xinyi's eyes reddened.
Her face had been calm until, after Xiang Wan finished speaking, her eyes suddenly filled with tears.
After having that nightmare, she felt that she might have deserved it, so she didn't blame her brother when he questioned her.
Until Xiang Wan smiled and spoke to her, a wave of grievances surged into Zhou Xinyi's heart. First, she had narrowly escaped death, but after waking up, she was faced with her beloved's suspicion.
She had been deceiving herself, thinking she shouldn't feel wronged, but for some reason, when Xiang Wan looked at her, she just felt very wronged.
Perhaps it was that harrowing journey at sea that made Zhou Xinyi feel that she and Xiang Wan were now very close.
What could be closer than walking together in times of life-threatening danger?
To some extent, at this time, Xiang Wan held a more important place in her heart than Zhou Chengze.
Zhou Xinyi looked at Xiang Wan, her voice concealing a grievance she herself was unaware of: "I didn't push you."
Xiang Wan's gaze was calm and gentle: "I know you didn't push me."
Not wanting to expose those around her to danger, she didn't reveal the existence of an author from another timeline, choosing instead to swallow her pride and say, "...I failed to stand firm."
Looking at the sharp glint in Xiang Wan's eyes, Zhou Xinyi felt that things were not as simple as she made them out to be. After all, even she couldn't explain how she fell into the sea.
But she didn't have the energy to think about those things. She looked at Xiang Wan on the hospital bed, her eyes suddenly becoming somewhat listless: "Sister Xiang Wan, during the month you were in a coma, did you have any dreams about your past life?"
"Past life?" Xiang Wan raised an eyebrow, looking at Zhou Xinyi's expression. She had a gut feeling that Zhou Xinyi seemed to have remembered her past life as well.
Instead of answering yes or no, she asked her in return, "What happened in your past life in your dreams?"
"During the three weeks I was in a coma, I had a very long nightmare..."
After waking up, that dream became a lingering shadow for Zhou Xinyi. Whenever she brought up that nightmare again, her expression would fluctuate between pain and confusion.
In the hospital room, her voice sounded almost unreal: "I dreamt that I became the other woman, and that I came between you and my brother."
When talking about the mistress, Zhou Xinyi's expression showed some pain: "But you died, and after you died, my brother lived a lonely life. I also chose to remain single for the rest of my life, but even so, I still feel that my sins have not been washed away..."
She looked at Xiang Wan, her eyes filled with pain and struggle.
Xiang Wan didn't look at her, but looked out the window without saying a word.
After three near-death experiences, her biggest realization was that perhaps none of the three of them were wrong.
Although Zhou Chengze and Zhou Xinyi betrayed her in her past life, it's more accurate to say that all three of them were like puppets in the author's hands than that they chose to betray her.
Everyone's thoughts and actions are controlled by that driving force, and they only truly have thoughts when they develop self-awareness.
They were being controlled, and what they did wasn't their own doing, so how can it be considered betrayal?
Xiang Wan looked at the sunlight outside the window, then turned her gaze to Zhou Xinyi: "It's just a dream, what past life could there be?"
"Besides, even if there really is a past life, the you in the past life is the you in the past life, and the you in this life saved me."
After saying that, she casually changed the subject: "You still haven't told me how you rescued me from the sea?"
Upon hearing Xiang Wan mention that harrowing experience, Zhou Xinyi's expression revealed a rare hint of youthful pride: "I swam for a very, very long time, dragging you towards the direction of the rising sun. I was thinking at the time, as long as I persevere..."
She kept talking, and Xiang Wan didn't interrupt her, occasionally chiming in with a few words.
*
Outside the ward, Che Nanbei moved his ear away from the ward door and looked at Zhou Chengze, who was leaning against the wall, and asked, "There was a lot of laughter and chatter inside, so why do you suspect that it was your sister who pushed Wanwan into the sea?"
Although Chen Yan didn't say anything, he looked at him with some curiosity, not to mention Shen Feiyang and Jiang Zhuochun.
Upon hearing this, Zhou Chengze pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingertips, looking unusually tired: "Maybe I'm overthinking it. I just find it a bit strange that the two of them fell into the water together."
"..."
It was a rather perfunctory answer, but since he wasn't telling the truth, the others couldn't do anything about it.
Before Zhou Xinyi arrived, the attending physician had already examined Xiang Wan's condition and found no problems. The pulmonary edema had also improved significantly after a month of intravenous fluid therapy.
Furthermore, having basically confirmed that Zhou Xinyi had not pushed him towards Dongguan, the group stopped eavesdropping.
Zhou Chengze was in even worse condition than the two who had fallen into the water. He gave a brief greeting to the group and was about to leave: "I'll head back now and come back tomorrow morning."
"..."
Not long after Zhou Xinyi left Xiang Wan's ward, Chen Yan came in.
The two exchanged a glance, and the atmosphere became inexplicably ambiguous.
Thinking of that hug not long ago, Chen Yan's heart couldn't help but flutter.
Upon seeing the wide-open window and the cigarette butts burning out on the windowsill, his brows, which had been relaxed, gradually furrowed: "Xiang Shuhan, you're still not well, yet you're out in the wind and smoking."
Hearing his 'complaint', Xiang Wan smiled. She looked at him for a long time, and finally uttered a sentence that she had been thinking about for a long time: "Chen Yan, I like you."
Upon hearing this, the man's brows instantly relaxed. He gently walked to her side, draped his coat over her hospital gown, and as he buttoned it for her, he lowered his eyes and couldn't help but smile, saying, "I like you too, Xiang Shuhan."
Hearing Xiang Wan chuckle, he said in a low voice, "Smoking is bad for your health, you should stop smoking."
"Um."
Xiang Wan looked at Chen Yan, who was closing the window for her, and said slowly, "I'd like to have plain congee for dinner. Could you go and buy me a bowl of plain congee?"
"good."
After he left, Xiang Wan was left alone in the ward. She stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling window of the VIP ward, looking down at the river view of the inpatient department, a helpless pain flashing in her eyes.
She was touched when Zhou Xinyi told her that Zhou Chengze chose to spend the rest of his life alone after her death.
In the world she lived in, the author was like God; the few lines she wrote were a record of her, Zhou Chengze's, and Zhou Xinyi's painful and struggling life.
They were weak and powerless, like marionettes.
The author uses his pen to depict their fates, manipulating them at will, showing that no matter how hard they try, they can't overcome the four words "the plot requires"...
How can she break this deadlock?
*
Not long after the incident of falling into the sea, Beiyi University started its semester.
In the new semester, Chen Yan went from a freshman to a sophomore, while Xiang Wan and the trio also moved up to senior year and are about to graduate.
Chen Yan and his two roommates were busy with the studio, while Xiang Wan spent five days a week at the company approving documents.
It wasn't until the company's lunch break that day, when she was walking into the coffee shop on the second floor with her coffee, that she saw Zhou Chengze sitting by the window.
Both of them paused for a moment when they saw each other. Zhou Chengze nodded to her, but Xiang Wan didn't respond and walk away as usual. Instead, she took her coffee and sat down opposite him...
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