Chapter 36 Chapter 36 "But Yu, I don't want to leave...
Jiang Mian's posture seemed to be preparing for Qiao Yu to throw herself into his arms - Qiao Yu did want to throw herself into his arms.
But he stopped halfway and stopped in front of Jiang Mian.
Jiang Mian opened his hands, then put them down again, looking at Qiao Yu with a smile: "Where did you buy the brakes? They work so well?"
Qiao Yu hugged him gently, and put her face on Jiang Mian's shoulder. She could smell the faint fragrance on him: "Why are you here?"
Jiang Mian rubbed the back of his head: "Didn't I say I would come to see you when I'm done with my work?"
All in all, it has been less than a week since Qiao Yu came back from Beijing. At that time, Jiang Mian was still a weak guy who needed his help to go to the toilet and felt dizzy at the slightest provocation. Now he can actually come so far from Beijing to Huaicheng.
"How long have you been waiting?" Qiao Yu asked again.
"It didn't take long," Jiang Mian said. "We arrived in Huaicheng in the evening."
Qiao Yu stepped back slightly and could see that there was still a small scar on Jiang Mian's left cheek that had not yet healed.
It may be that the recovery is better, or it may be because it is dark and the light is weak. In short, you can't see it unless you look carefully. The large piece of gauze that was used at the beginning was actually just thunder but small rain.
But I still feel sad.
Qiao Yu raised his hand, but because he was outside, he hesitated and didn't touch it. In the end, he looked away and clenched his sleeves with his fingers.
"Is your leg better?" Qiao Yu looked down, then raised his head again, "Does your head still hurt? How much of your memory have you recovered?"
"My legs can walk and my head is fine. I've been busy with other things recently. My memory recovery has to rely on reading emails for the time being." Jiang Mian lowered his eyes and answered every question carefully.
Qiao Yu pursed his lips: "Did you see anything?"
Jiang Mian closed his eyes lightly: "I found this place by feeling the address."
Because of the brain damage caused by the first car accident, which also had an unpredictable impact on subsequent memory, the doctor suggested that he try to record his life, but he was not the kind of person who could pick up a pen and paper at any time.
So Jiang Mian simply sent himself email after email, recording everything that happened after he first lost his memory.
This is actually a good method, which ensures privacy while recording time accurately to the minute and second.
In addition, he cannot do without emails in his daily work. Even if he suddenly loses his memory one day in the future, he can easily find many "unread" emails and open up his past memories alone.
Jiang Mian glanced through it initially, and then whenever he had some free time, he would take it out and read it again, like reading a diary, and go through it again along the chronological line.
When he discovered that others had treated him indifferently five years ago, he also discovered that he had treated Qiao Yu equally indifferently five years later.
Persistent, threatening and forcing.
Jiang Mian didn't hide anything about himself, and there was a hint of personal emotion when he recorded.
But a few months later, he stepped out of those emotions, watched the whole thing with a frown, and felt that even so, Qiao Yu still ran to Beijing to stay with him after his car accident, which was considered doting.
He was very glad that he retained his intuition while losing his memory, and his intuition came in handy the moment he saw Qiao Yu.
Love is a habit engraved in instinct.
"Did you come directly to Huai University?" Qiao Yu continued to ask. "Have you gone home? Have you seen grandma?"
"I have met you before," Jiang Mian pinched Qiao Yu's face, "Why? Grandma is waiting for you."
When Jiang Mian came, he thought Qiao Yu would be in class, so he didn't notify her so as not to delay her.
Furthermore, he wanted to take a trip around Huaicheng, which might help him recover his memory.
Unfortunately, time was too tight and it was already very late when he arrived here. When he found the tube building and saw Aunt Sun, he was told without saying a few words that Qiao Yu was probably coming back.
Jiang Mian ran to the school to pick someone up again.
When the two of them got home again, grandma was half asleep and waiting to take a look at Qiao Yu.
Qiao Yu went into the room and coaxed the old man for a while, then came out after the old man fell asleep.
Jiang Mian was chatting with Aunt Sun. The two of them were talking and laughing, and seemed to be quite familiar with each other. Aunt Sun even stood up and looked at Jiang Mian's head carefully.
"It seems normal to me," Aunt Sun said, "As long as he's safe, that's good."
Jiang Mian smiled and nodded: "Yeah, as long as everyone is safe."
Aunt Sun sighed, as if she felt sorry for Jiang Mian's tragic experience.
But she quickly came back to reality and said to the 1.2-meter-tall bed by the wall, "Why haven't you two left yet? Are you going to sleep here tonight?"
Jiang Mian raised his eyebrows: "Did we both walk alone before?"
"What else?" Aunt Sun said, "This small bed can only sleep one person."
When she said this, Aunt Sun looked at them with the same openness as she looked at the two little kids from the neighborhood.
But Qiao Yu, one of the parties involved, felt inexplicably guilty when being stared at like this. He lowered his head and pushed Jiang Mian, and the two of them walked out of the door together.
Jiang Mian walked to the bedroom and took a look, then shared: "Grandma doesn't beat me now."
Qiao Yu opened his eyes wide in surprise: "You remember?"
"A little bit," Jiang Mian leaned against Qiao Yu and looked around, "and I felt that... everything here is very familiar."
Jiang Mian grew up here, and he had walked the intersection at the alley countless times every day on his way to and from school.
Qiao Yu took him through each step, and he felt like he was reliving his teenage years.
Jiang Mian listened to Qiao Yu's chatter in silence, and didn't say a word the whole time.
It was already very late and the road was empty, not even a car.
There are lights on the roadside, illuminating everything around, but the brighter the light, the quieter and empty it seems.
Qiao Yu turned her head to look at the people around her. Jiang Mian was rarely so silent. His eyes were always fixed straight ahead, and he seemed to be full of thoughts.
"Are you in a bad mood?" Qiao Yu asked.
"No," Jiang Mian came back to his senses, "I'm thinking about something."
The accident was not fatal, but it left him in a coma for four days.
Frontal lobe damage causes transient brain fog symptoms; mild damage can be gradually recovered.
But as the time he was awake increased, Jiang Mian clearly felt that his memory had declined.
He flipped through the emails every day but couldn't remember anything more about the past. This time he hurried to Huaicheng, firstly to see Qiao Yu, and secondly to see if he could recover his memory as quickly as before.
But unfortunately, he couldn't remember much so far.
Countless images flashed through his mind, and he wanted to capture them, but it was difficult to grasp them.
He remembered his forgetfulness, but he was powerless to do anything about it, which made Jiang Mian very uncomfortable. He couldn't find an effective method and could only let those familiar feelings slowly fade away.
"What do you want?" Qiao Yu asked tentatively, "Can I help?"
Jiang Mian shook his head, not planning to tell the other party about this for the time being: "Jiang family matters."
Qiao Yu said "Oh", he really couldn't help with those things.
Moreover, for him and Jiang Mian, the Jiang family was sandwiched between them, which was a very embarrassing existence.
That was a place that Qiao Yu couldn't reach, and it also proved that Jiang Mian had been away for five years.
These two poor boys should not have had such an experience, but that's what happened.
Qiao Yu had no idea about the Jiang family; those things were beyond his understanding.
"A Mian," he said hesitantly, "what do you do in Beijing?"
Jiang Mian was talking about nothing more than handling official business, business trip inspections and the like, but that was not what Qiao Yu wanted to hear.
The three bullets that Jiang Mian pointed at his head were still a shadow to him. He was scared and didn't want it to happen again one day.
Moreover, Jiang Mian had previously revealed some of the Jiang family's illegal activities, and he was unwilling to let Jiang Mian get involved.
But he just couldn't bring himself to persuade Jiang Mian to give up everything the Jiang family had and return to Huaicheng from Jingshi.
After struggling all the way, I returned home.
Qiao Yu stood in the entrance hall and looked into the living room for a while.
This was the first time he came to this place calmly, without any coercion or quarrel. He even brought Jiang Mian here with him. This was their home prepared by Jiang Mian.
Qiao Yu was too embarrassed to finish her words, and simply explained whether Jiang Mian bought or rented the house.
However, the next second, Jiang Mian spoke instead.
“I bought it.”
Qiao Yu looked at him: "Huh?"
"Does it match?" Jiang Mian walked into the house in slippers. "What is your imagination of home?"
Qiao Yu paused, looked at Jiang Mian standing in the living room and looked around, then walked to the sofa, bent down and picked up a pillow in his hand, which was very soft.
Qiao Yu also changed into slippers and followed him in: "I haven't looked at it carefully before."
The first time they came into contact with anything related to housing was when they were in junior high school. At that time, the tube-shaped buildings were clamoring to be demolished every day.
Real estate agents often come here to hand out flyers saying that a new residential complex has been built in such and such a place, facing north and south, with a fountain garden downstairs.
Because the advertising paper was of very good quality, Qiao Yu would keep the folding fan in the summer. Occasionally, when he was absent-minded in class, he would read the advertisements on it and thought that his future goal should be to buy a house like this one, with a fountain garden outside the door.
But as he grows older, Qiao Yu now feels that the concept of "home" means that as long as the family is there, it doesn't matter where they are.
As for fountains and gardens, they are not important.
Before going to bed, Qiao Yu took a bath.
When Jiang Mian came out, he was making a phone call by the bedroom window. When he heard the noise behind him, he turned around and hung up the phone.
"You say yours." Qiao Yu took her clothes and went out to wash them.
Jiang Mian followed him and said, "No big deal."
The washing machine was on the balcony. Qiao Yu threw the clothes in and planned to wash them tomorrow.
He happened to have no classes the next morning, and had been planning to go to the lab to run his simulation with Zhou Shuhe, but now that Jiang Mian was here, he decided not to go.
"When do we go to bed?" Jiang Mian leaned against the door frame, lazily.
Qiao Yu turned around and almost bumped into him: "Right away."
Qiao Yu subconsciously stepped back a little, and Jiang Mian also stood up straight: "Are you hiding from me?"
"No," Qiao Yu raised his hand and scratched his temples, "Just a little..."
There was something that was never said in the end, and Qiao Yu herself couldn't find a specific word to describe their relationship.
It wasn't awkward, but it wasn't natural either.
He was still a little nervous when facing Jiang Mian. It was not that he treated the other party like a young master like Luo Hao did, but they had been separated for too long and had experienced too much after the reunion. The two of them were no longer the teenagers they used to be, so naturally they would not get along the same way as before.
But Qiao Yu still hasn't figured out what method to use.
Jiang Mian was in the hospital before, so he should have taken care of him. He always had an excuse to stay with him.
Now that I'm discharged from the hospital, I can't just cling to the other person like a pendant.
and……
Jiang Mian can sometimes be as dangerous as taking the wrong medicine...
Qiao Yu poured a glass of water. When he returned to the bedroom, Zhou Shuhe had just handed him the sorted form and asked him if he was going home again in the evening.
Qiao Yu gave a brief reply, then sat on the bed and opened the form.
As I was watching, a head suddenly rested on my shoulder.
Qiao Yu turned her head slightly and happened to meet Jiang Mian's eyes.
The other person blinked, his eyelashes almost poking his lips: "What are you looking at?"
Qiao Yu turned his face back and tilted the phone screen towards Jiang Mian: "Statistics of the last few days."
Jiang Mian pretended to take a look and said, "It looks quite stable."
Qiao Yu chuckled and said, "Those that are not stable have been screened out."
The topic touched upon something familiar, and Qiao Yu spoke a lot more.
After finishing the work at hand, he put his phone on the bedside. Instead of rushing to go to bed, he stared at Jiang Mian for a while.
"What are you thinking about?" Jiang Mian lifted the quilt and patted the pillow beside him. "I'm tired after a day's work. I'm just going to sleep tonight."
Qiao Yu felt a little hot on her face, but she didn't stop herself from being stubborn: "Did I say anything? You're just overthinking it."
The bed is very big and it’s not crowded at all for two people to lie on it.
Jiang Mian stretched out his arms to turn off the light, then lay on his back and stared at the ceiling, really doing nothing.
"Let's chat," he said.
Qiao Yu didn't sleep either: "What are you talking about?"
"What kind of person was I before?" Jiang Mian thought for a moment and added, "Seventeen or eighteen years old."
"Haven't we been talking about this all the way?" Qiao Yu asked.
"In your eyes," Jiang Mian lay on his side, his tone softened, "Tell me about us."
There was nothing much to talk about between them. They just wandered through life with three meals a day and all four seasons in a row.
Besides, both sides can feel the feelings. They are so close that it cannot be hidden. Jiang Mian's words broke the window paper, and they were completely and unavoidably trapped.
"And then... we got together."
Qiao Yu recalled the fireworks on New Year’s Eve that year. It seemed like it was just yesterday, yet it seemed like a long time ago.
He remembered the colorful firelight falling on Jiang Mian's face, red and yellow, making Jiang Mian's eyes bright.
“I didn’t know much at the time.”
Qiao Yu started laughing as he spoke.
He tilted his head to look at Jiang Mian. With the help of a little moonlight, he could vaguely see the outline of his face, which looked like undulating hills covered with silvery white snow.
At that time, Qiao Yu didn't quite understand what "together" meant, but when Jiang Mian led him in front, he followed without hesitation.
Compared to now, I don’t dare to do that anymore.
"I always blamed you before. I blamed you for being gone for so long without saying anything. Grandma was sick, but you didn't come back to see her. But now I know that you are also sick. You haven't had an easy time abroad these years."
"But you have become much better. You used to not even recognize all 26 letters, but now you can speak fluent English. I also think that maybe it was right for you to leave."
Jiang Mian said in a low voice: "Why are you saying this?"
"You need to talk." Qiao Yu sighed softly.
He stared at the chandelier on the ceiling, his focus blurred and his thoughts drifting away.
It was like going back to a night six years ago, and I could still vaguely hear the harsh sound of the jerky bearings turning.
Qiao Yu was angry at Jiang Mian for leaving without saying goodbye, and also angry at his weakness and betrayal.
But now he felt that he should not use his own moral bottom line to ask Jiang Mian to endure hardship.
"A Mian, I just want to tell you that I don't blame you for what happened in the past."
After he finished speaking, the room was silent for a long time.
It was so long that Qiao Yu was about to fall asleep before he heard Jiang Mian laughing softly.
"But Yu, I didn't intend to leave."
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