Xiao Cui turned around and said, "Zhijun, can you tell me why you were sent down to work in the lower levels?"
Qi Zhijun opened his mouth but didn't say anything. Xiao Cui paused for a moment and said, "You know how to avoid trouble, but have you thought about me? I've been working in logistics and only recently transferred back to teaching. Of course, I don't resent you, I just want to tell you that since you can't shelter me from the storm, let me rest quietly in my own little haven for a while. Thank you!" As he spoke, he gave Qi Zhijun a slight bow.
Qi Zhijun stepped forward and gently grasped Xiao Cui's shoulder, pleading with a sob in her voice, "I'm sorry, it's my fault. I only thought about my family and myself at the time and didn't consider you at all. But we are family, shouldn't we stand together through thick and thin when problems arise?"
Xiao Cui gently pushed his hand down and said softly, "Please forgive my selfishness. I can't face the problems between you and your family right now. Let's both calm down and find a solution."
Qi Zhijun pleaded urgently, "Little Cui, come home with me first, we'll talk about everything there! Okay? I'm begging you!"
Xiao Cui shook her head. "I don't want to go back and face your family right now. You go back first! Give my regards to my family." With that, she resolutely turned and took a step away. It was that one step that widened the distance between the two of them.
Qi Zhijun nodded slightly and smiled. "Are you waiting for me to bring up divorce?"
Xiao Cui stopped and said without turning her head, "If this is your intention and you feel it's good for you, I can accept it!"
Looking at the woman who had almost entered his heart, Qi Zhijun felt a pang of sadness and wanted to cry even from just her back. He suppressed the pain in his heart and said, "You've put on a show waiting for me to say goodbye, is that to give me some final dignity? Then thank you!"
Xiao Cui paused, a poem flashing through her mind—a poem she had once copied for Wang Yanda: "I once loved you: Love, perhaps, hasn't completely died in my heart, but I hope it won't bother you again, and I don't want to cause you any more sorrow. I once loved you silently and hopelessly, enduring both shyness and the torment of jealousy. I once loved you so sincerely and so tenderly, may God bless you, and may another love you as I did." Yes! Love is beautiful, but love with imperfections is all the more unforgettable. Perhaps that was true of her and Qi Zhijun as well.
She whispered, "Forgive me, I really can't accept this torrential rain and strong winds. I'm not good at handling problems and I'm too immature. But in the face of this situation, I really can't face it calmly. If you wish to part ways here, then I hope that one day we can both grow into the best version of ourselves and meet again. Or we can simply give each other space to slowly process this problem, and come back together when we can face life calmly!"
After saying that, he strode away, and a few bright red maple leaves fell from the tree, as if mocking Qi Zhijun. The love he pursued was illusory, just like these rootless red maple leaves. He waited for a winter and longed for a spring and summer. Finally, he saw the beauty, but it withered away.
Qi Zhijun couldn't help but laugh self-deprecatingly, "Qi Zhijun, you really are a failure. The dignity you once cared about most has become a series of resounding slaps in your face. This feeling must be what they call reaping what you sow!"
He couldn't help but think of Wei Shuqing again, the woman who often cried hysterically, whom he despised as selfish, petty, incomprehensible, and full of flaws with no merits.
He now despises himself. Empathy is just an idiom, nothing more. How can one understand the despair of a time if the experience hasn't happened to them?
He passed by a noodle shop in a daze, and saw the person inside eating with sweat pouring down their face. He thought that maybe he needed a bowl of noodles to warm his soul, which felt like it had fallen into an ice cave, and also to warm the cold heart and lungs that Wei Shuqing had described.
Entering this noisy noodle shop, I said to the impatient young female server, "Comrade, a bowl of mutton offal noodles, please!"
The woman didn't even lift her eyelids. "Three cents, no ticket required!"
Qi Zhijun, for the first time ever, spent three cents on a bowl of mutton offal noodles. After the noodles arrived, he found a place to sit down, added three heaping spoonfuls of chili oil, stirred it well, and took just one bite. He coughed violently from the spiciness, tears streaming down his face. He didn't know if it was from the spiciness or from the sadness, but he ate the noodles in large mouthfuls, sweat pouring down his forehead. Finally, he added five more spoonfuls of aged vinegar, drinking the spicy and sour broth. He remembered the line, "Mistaking aged vinegar for ink, writing half a lifetime of sourness on paper. Even more fearful is the mixture of vinegar and ink, half a life of bitterness, half a life of sourness."
He even hated himself for turning his good life into this. Even this bowl of mutton offal noodles, which he used to think was just ordinary, reminded him of his ungratefulness. Wei Shuqing used to hand over her salary and keep only two yuan for herself, and she would buy a bowl of mutton offal noodles or a bowl of meat wontons for his family every few days.
It was the same noisy little noodle shop. The thin Wei Shuqing pulled the tall Qi Zhijun in and said, "Boss, one bowl of mutton offal noodles and one bowl of clear soup."
Then the two sat down. A bowl of steaming hot mutton offal noodles, paired with Wei Shuqing's sallow and thin appearance, made her seem even more selfish, mean, and cynical.
He would impatiently interrupt her as she talked about the Qi family in the noodle shop, saying, "Alright, do you have to bring up family matters? Is that really necessary?"
At this point, Wei Shuqing would pout and tell him to swallow his food. Seeing him put down his chopsticks with an impatient look on his face, she would immediately apologize, "Okay, okay, I won't say anything more. You eat quickly, this noodle will become gamey and not taste good when it gets cold."
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