Xiang Ziye's pupils contracted again. In a flash, he remembered that night many years ago...
He used the snack coupons he exchanged with a colleague to buy snacks from Daoxiangcun to visit his fiancée who was hospitalized.
After being missing for a day and a night at the reservoir, Ye Qiu seemed to have fallen and gotten caught in the rain, developing a fever and being hospitalized.
"Xiao Qiu, look what I brought you!" he asked with a smile.
Ye Qiu was much quieter than usual. She sat on the edge of the bed with her back to him, as if she had no interest in her favorite snacks at all.
He picked up two more books and walked over, asking gently, "Don't you have an appetite? I also brought you two imported Soviet medical books, your favorites. They can help you pass the time while you're in the hospital."
When his hand landed on her shoulder, Ye Qiu instantly shrank back to the headboard.
He noticed the bandage around her neck and asked with some concern, "Did you hurt your neck? Did I bump you just now?"
Ye Qiu didn't look at him, but leaned against the headboard and asked him softly, "Ah Ye, I read Eileen Chang's 'Love in a Fallen City.' The male protagonist in the story eventually married Bai Liusu, who had been with several women. What about you? Would you marry a wife like that?"
He frowned slightly, somewhat puzzled: "Xiao Qiu, why are you suddenly interested in these old-fashioned, pre-liberation stuff? It's decadent and corrupt bourgeois stuff. How could a normal man marry a woman who's been with several men?"
Ye Qiu was silent for a moment, then suddenly said, "But Bai Liusu in the novel was forced to be with those men. What if she was coerced..."
He knew Ye Qiu occasionally enjoyed discussing literature with him, so he thought about it seriously for a moment, then shook his head.
"I will stay true to myself for the person I love. I will only have one partner in my life. I may not be able to accept that my wife has been with many men, even if she was forced to."
After saying that, he looked at her with some concern: "You'd better not read those frivolous books. It wouldn't be good if someone found out."
Ye Qiu closed his eyes and remained silent for a while before saying in a hoarse voice, "Okay, I understand, Ye. I'm tired. You can go back now."
He wanted to say something more, but the nurses outside urged him on—"Visiting time is over. Family members who are not staying to care for the patient, please leave!"
He could only say goodbye to his fiancée, whose back was turned to him: "Xiao Qiu, I'll come see you again tomorrow. Goodbye."
Looking at the moonlight outside the window, Ye Qiu said softly, "Goodbye... Ye."
He remembered how the cold moonlight fell on her, pale and gray, like a faded painting.
He never imagined that from then on, she would truly be completely separated from him... to the point that she would never want to see him again.
Xiang Ziye's body stiffened, his mind filled with the image of Ye Qiu's slender and frail back from many years ago and her soft "goodbye".
His lips moved as if he wanted to say something, but a dry sound came from his throat: "I..."
"Guess why she'd rather bear the stigma of having an improper relationship with Rong Zhaonan than tell you the truth? Because you gave her a negative answer from the start."
Ning Yuan said softly, looking at him with icy eyes, "I can understand your thinking. A man cannot accept an unfaithful wife, especially when he himself is still 'clean'."
Let alone the 1970s and 1980s, even in the 21st century, there are plenty of men with this kind of thinking.
Ning Yuan said expressionlessly—
"No one has the right to demand that a young woman in her twenties, after being gang-raped and nearly killed, can still calmly recount everything she has endured. She just wanted to preserve the last shred of human dignity, and there's nothing wrong with that."
In the 21st century, women who have been raped or sexually assaulted and report it to the police are still often met with strange looks from those around them.
Moreover, this was the conservative 1970s, and women who lost their virginity were called "broken shoes" and were only despised.
The world will not pity her, it will only despise her!
"Besides, from the very beginning, you cut off her path and denied her the chance to tell the truth," Ning Yuan said coldly.
Xiang Ziye stared at her blankly for a long time, then suddenly curled his lips into a contemptuous smile—
"You're just making this up. Even if Ye Qiu didn't say anything, why didn't Rong Zhaonan say anything either? He'd rather we misunderstand him, and he even almost killed us. Your lie isn't very clever."
Ning Yuan said coldly, "Because Ye Qiu, after being gang-raped and nearly strangled to death, still managed to rescue him from a trap where he had fallen into a pit and fainted."
"It rained heavily that day, and the pit was full of water. If Ye Qiu hadn't tried everything to wake him up and save him, Rong Zhaonan would have drowned."
Ning Yuan stared intently at Xiang Ziye and asked softly, "Leaving aside Ye Qiu's past kindness in taking care of him, helping him, and showing him the care of family, just consider this life-saving grace. She cried and begged him never to mention it. If it were you, would you tell him?"
Xiang Ziye closed his eyes helplessly, his throat so dry he couldn't speak, and clenched his fists.
“He kept his promise to his benefactor, even at such a terrible price.” Ning Yuan said with a hint of helplessness and exhaustion.
Recalling the way Rong Zhaonan clutched his head in anguish as he recounted these events, she was equally shaken.
She couldn't say who was right or wrong; she only felt powerless.
Everything seemed like a huge trap set by fate, manipulated by He Su, and further fueled by the coldness of the world and its intolerance of women who had lost their virginity.
A black hole-like trap of lies devours everyone and everything that gets close, shattering the fates of all innocent people.
Xiang Ziye suddenly seemed to have found a loophole in her words, and he sneered, grabbing Ning Yuan's arm—
"Rong Zhaonan is really good at hiding himself. He kept his promise, so what is he saying now? Hasn't he just revealed himself to you as a hypocritical little man who flaunts his own nobility!"
Lies! They were all lies Ning Yuan told to survive!
Xiang Ziye's eyes were bloodshot as he laughed mockingly.
It's all fake, they're all lying to him, but he doesn't believe it!
Ning Yuan frowned slightly, looking at Xiang Ziye, whose body was stiff and whose eyes were trembling, and said calmly—
"Because he has been investigating what happened back then for years, he always felt that the night at the reservoir was not a sudden incident, but a carefully planned event."
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