Chapter 13
It suddenly started raining outside the car window. The raindrops slid down the window, forming streaks of water, and the pedestrians outside became a little blurry.
Fang Zhao subconsciously searched his backpack, but there was no umbrella.
Since she started working, she has been living alone in a city more than 400 kilometers away from home, with no relatives. The habit of always carrying an umbrella in her bag has been with her for many years.
She looked at the rain outside the window with some worry. It seemed that she would get wet in the rain today.
Unexpectedly, the minibus turned around and a figure wearing a raincoat and holding a small flower umbrella appeared at the entrance of the village. It was my mother!
Yes, in this small county town, how could I get wet in the rain just because I didn’t bring an umbrella.
After getting out of the car, Fang Zhao threw himself into his mother's arms.
"Be careful not to slip." The mother subconsciously tried to avoid her daughter's attack, as she was soaked by the rain. However, Fang Zhao's attack was too powerful, and she was afraid her daughter would fall, so she had to let her daughter hold her.
"You're such a grown-up, yet you're still so reckless."
Holding an umbrella in one hand, Mother Guo lovingly touched her daughter's hair with the other hand.
"Are you tired? I made your favorite sweet and sour pork ribs."
Fang Zhao shook his head, smelled the scent of his mother's arms, and smiled at her coquettishly.
It feels so good to be so close to home and be able to go home at any time.
Of course, such a happy "mother-daughter relationship" did not last long.
"I heard from your classmates that you've been getting close to An Huainan recently."
On the way home, my mother suddenly asked.
"Which classmate?"
"Don't worry about which classmate. Didn't I tell you that the most important thing for high school students is to focus on studying? Are you in a relationship? I've noticed your grades have been dropping significantly lately. Is this related to it?"
Fang Zhao felt suffocated, a familiar feeling.
My mother was the same ten years ago. As long as she found anything that was not related to studying in my schoolbag or bedroom, she would start lecturing me without asking any questions.
Moreover, the mother has her own set of excuses. For example, it was Fang Zhao’s fault that he received the love letter. After all, “flies don’t bite seamless eggs”. If Fang Zhao was honest and decent, would boys send her love letters?
Fang Zhao felt powerless against these thoughts, so when she returned home for the holiday today, she changed into the "ugly clothes" her mother had bought for her.
"Why are you silent? Did I get it right? How can you be so young and not feel ashamed? You're such a worry to me. Look at the child from XX family. He worked so hard and ended up getting into Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He made his parents proud. And look at you—"
Fang Zhao didn't want to listen to the rest of the words. His mother was almost pointing at his nose and scolding him for being shameless. By then, his good mood for returning home had been almost ruined.
It seems like it’s good to be far away from home.
*
"Huainan."
In the hospital, Mother Qin, who had just been pushed out of the operating room, held An Huainan's hand and spoke to him with some difficulty.
The sound of rain outside the window gradually became louder, and the chaotic noise made people feel very irritated.
Ten years ago, during a heavy rain like this, he suddenly lost his mother.
Unexpectedly, fate would make him relive the pain of losing his mother.
An Huainan didn't say anything, but silently took out a box of rice candy from his bag. He bought it from Xiaoji Rice Candy Shop, his mother's favorite.
When he asked for leave this time, he knew the day was almost up, so he bought some and put them in his bag on the way home.
Ten years ago, his biggest regret was that his mother didn't get to eat this rice candy before she died.
An Huainan's hands were shaking, and tears were about to fall from his eyes. He lowered his head and calmed down for a while before bringing the rice candy to his mother's bedside. He smiled and asked, "Look what I bought?"
"Yeah, rice krispie treats."
A hint of surprise flashed in Qin's mother's eyes. She had been ill for so long and had been eating 'sick meals' for so long that she had completely forgotten what she liked.
She wanted to raise her hand to take a piece, but she couldn't do it. An Huainan shook the head of the bed, took a piece of rice candy, crushed it, and fed it to her mother bit by bit.
"Delicious, delicious." Mother Qin looked at her son who had grown up so well and was so caring, with a look of relief on her face.
She understood that she would not be able to stay with her son for much longer.
After her husband died in a car accident, she was so angry and depressed that she knew she was incurable. Now she was at the end of her rope and just wanted to see her son go to college.
I've been feeling particularly bad these days. I'm afraid I won't even be able to see my son go to college.
Thinking of this, Mother Qin felt sad.
After eating two bites, Mother Qin signaled An Huainan to take out what was under her pillow.
Although An Huainan was puzzled, he still did as he was told. It turned out to be a red passbook. He held the passbook, feeling a little strange. Did this thing appear ten years ago?
"Huainan."
His mother's call brought him back to his senses, and he responded softly, "Yeah."
"Mom heard that Fang Zhao is a good girl. It's just that her family conditions are much better than ours, and Mom is afraid that you are not worthy of her. This money is Mom's private money, take it, you will need money a lot in the future."
"Mom is unlucky. I won't see you get married and have children. I've wronged you all these years, having to deal with parents like us. If you were born into a wealthy family, you wouldn't have to—"
Speaking of this, Mother Qin choked up a little.
An Huainan had already burst into tears.
"Fang Zhao is a good person. You have to hold on to him. You can't be like this before, like a sullen person, keeping everything in your heart. You've already lost a girl. If you lose her again this time, Mom won't tolerate it."
An Huainan looked at Mother Qin in shock. How did she know?
"In this dream created by the Little River God for you and Fang Zhao, only the two of you are living souls. Everyone else is just a shadow of the real world. I am already dead, so how could there be any trace of me left in the real world? The me you see now is just a breath I deliberately released after asking the Eastern Ghost Emperor for help."
Mother Qin raised her hand tremblingly, wanting to touch her child. An Huainan obediently moved his head closer.
"My dear, Mommy misses you very much. Your daddy misses you too. Live well. You have your mommy and daddy's blood in you. As long as you live well, your mommy and daddy will never leave you."
"Mother!"
An Huainan seemed to see the breath of his mother suddenly dissipate, and then the sharp sound of a machine came through, and his mother was gone.
The doctors suddenly rushed in, just like they did ten years ago, and used various rescue methods one after another. Only An Huainan was stunned, as if he was out of tune with this environment.
After experiencing it again, it seemed as if all his tears had run dry.
He just watched numbly what was happening in front of him, tightly clutching the red passbook in his hand.
****
An Huainan took a week off, and Fang Zhao felt that the whole world was empty.
An Huainan had never discussed his family situation directly with Fang Zhao. On the one hand, he was afraid that Fang Zhao would worry, and on the other hand, his family was indeed his "fatal flaw", and he still had some inferiority complex.
Ten years ago, after his mother passed away, he took care of everything at home. Facing the empty room, he always felt that the world was so big, as if he was the only one left.
Ten years later, when An Huainan had taken care of everything again, there was another person waiting for him in the world.
This feeling is so good.
At first, Fang Zhao suspected that some busybodies had exaggerated the relationship between him and An Huainan and told not only his own parents but also An Huainan's parents.
She had never met An Huainan's parents, so she didn't know whether they were open-minded enough to accept that their precious son had a close friend of the opposite sex at school.
Anyway, her parents are incapable of accepting it.
Fang Zhao had been at home for the past two days, her ears practically callused. Despite repeated assurances that she and An Huainan weren't dating, her parents refused to believe her. They forced her through a two-day brainwashing session, even taking her to watch numerous documentaries about premature love, each with a more tragic ending than the last.
Fang Zhao was about to vomit, so he simply closed the door and went to bed early, hiding in his space to find peace and quiet, and only wanted to think about school starting.
In fact, at this stage of senior high school, there are still only a few children who have no sense of propriety like her.
I remember that ten years ago, those children in their class who had feelings for each other and were able to handle these feelings correctly, all achieved good results, and three couples even got married. How could this not be considered a good thing?
Problems like premature love cannot be suppressed blindly, but must be guided correctly.
But Fang Zhao understood that given his parents' educational background, it was pointless to say these things, so he simply stopped talking.
On Sunday afternoon, Fang Zhao returned to school early.
But during the evening study session, I didn’t see An Huainan.
Could it be that An Huainan was also being "tortured" by his parents? Of course, anyone with a son who was a "prodigy of Peking University or Tsinghua University" would be devastated if he was "tortured" by a girl with poor academic performance. If this situation wasn't handled properly, it would ruin their own child's future.
When Fang Zhao was in evening self-study, she would look towards the door from time to time. She was worried that a couple of parents would suddenly rush in and shoot her with a gun.
But obviously, her worries were unnecessary.
During the entire evening study session, nothing happened except for the head teacher coming in and taking a look to make sure everyone had returned to school safely.
"Zhaozi, why are you so uneasy?"
Evening self-study was over, but Fang Zhao was still sitting in his seat, staring at the door in a daze.
It turns out that the days when he didn't show up were sometimes quite difficult to endure.
"Waiting for your An Huainan?"
Xiaoqian teased, and when she didn't respond, she walked over and pulled her.
"Did you hear me? Why are you so stunned?"
Fang Zhao finally reacted, "Oh, get out of class is over, let's go back to the dormitory together."
Liu Xuefeng came over with a bag of grapes. "When I returned to school, I saw the lady at the door selling them. They looked quite fresh. Since you like them, I bought you a bag."
"Wow, how can you be so thoughtful."
Fang Zhao teased, he was indeed a little envious.
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