23 We have not yet discovered the meaning of life (3)
Lin Jing froze in place, feeling ashamed as if he had been caught doing something bad.
Li Yaya's face was calm and her expression was normal. She walked forward and asked, "Why are you here?"
"I—we have a research project in our major, and it happens to be in Huanshan." Lin Jing felt a little nervous because of Li Yaya's sudden question.
"I'm asking why you're following me."
"I came out for a walk and met you by chance. I wanted to see what you were doing." Lin Jing's nervousness disappeared and he calmed down.
"How long have you been following me? Look what I've done."
"A long time. As for what you did—" Lin Jing thought of the strange man again in his mind, "It depends on whether you have done anything wrong."
Once a man's suspicion arises in his heart, he will be full of doubts about everything around him.
Like a sticky shadow, he silently crawled in the gaps of every conversation, and even the most ordinary eye contact could be dyed a suspicious gray by him.
"What could I possibly do that would be wrong?"
"It's better not to do it."
Li Yaya heard a hint of sarcasm in Lin Jing's tone. Could it be that Lin Jing knew something, which was why she acted like this? Impossible—she hadn't said anything, and Shao Lan certainly wouldn't tell her. How could she know? She must have been overthinking it.
Li Yaya didn't want to have any more conversation with Lin Jing, so she turned sideways and walked back the way she came.
Lin Jing remained calm and just followed Li Yaya.
They walked like this for a while, following Li Yaya when she walked, and stopping when she stopped. Li Yaya could no longer bear it, so she stopped and asked, "Why are you following me?"
"have no idea."
"Lin Jing, are you sick?"
"Yes, I am sick, and it's very serious."
Li Yaya was speechless. There was no way she could communicate normally with Lin Jing.
Li Yaya turned around and continued walking. When she reached a T-junction, she suddenly started running in the opposite direction. Li Yaya's action was so sudden that by the time Lin Jing realized what was happening, she had already run more than ten meters away.
Without hesitation, he chased after him.
There was the sound of wind passing by her ears. Li Yaya was tired from running. She could feel the sweat on her body, and the smell of alcohol. After an unknown amount of time, Li Yaya collapsed on the curb, gasping for breath. Lin Jing stopped not far away and slowly walked over to Li Yaya. But when he got closer, he found that Li Yaya was already in tears.
Lin Jing was now at a loss. Why was Li Yaya crying? He didn't even have a tissue to offer her to wipe her tears.
After thinking for a while, Lin Jing took off his shirt and jacket and handed it to Li Yaya, "There's no tissue, so you'll have to make do with this."
Li Yaya didn't take it, but took out two crumpled tissues from her pocket. She didn't wipe her tears, but just wiped her nose.
A long time ago, Li Yaya developed the habit of carrying tissues with her. As a terminal esophageal cancer patient, she often coughed up foreign matter, and she always had to have tissues to catch and wipe it away.
Only when he got closer did Lin Jing smell the scent of alcohol on Li Yaya.
"Drinking?"
"Well, it's a holiday today, I was happy, so I drank a little." Li Yaya lay down on the curb. This position allowed her to see the moon very well.
When she was little, Li Yaya would often lie in the yard and look at the moon. She would fall asleep while looking at the moon, and then Li Jianren would carry her into the room.
Lin Jing also followed Li Yaya and lay down beside her.
"Lin Jing, don't you think that life is truly wonderful? Who would have thought that one day we would be lying on the side of the road together, watching the moon."
“Well, it’s wonderful.”
This scene may be a little weird, but Lin Jing enjoys it a little.
"Lin Jing, have you been doing well these past few years?"
Li Yaya's sudden question caught Lin Jing off guard, and he didn't know how to answer for a moment.
She was the one crying, but he was the one who was cared for.
Lin Jing, how are you?
——He wanted to say no.
His every move was under Shao Lan's surveillance. As he lived a repetitive life day after day, he gradually lost contact with Li Yaya, until he lost all trace and news of Li Yaya.
The effortless grades he achieved and the teacher's obvious favoritism made him a thorn in the side of his classmates. Although he didn't care about these people, it was quite pitiful that he had never had a true friend who was completely his own.
He had never made his own choices, had no favorite things, and no direction in life. Shao Lan pointed a step, and he moved. Lin Yuanshen only cared about grades.
His world is empty.
——But he lived a good life.
It is easy to have things that others struggle to get, not to mention the external things like houses and cars.
Postgraduate study, subject research, project participation, etc.
The future that awaits him is bright and glorious.
Is he too greedy and unsatisfied?
Li Yaya glanced at the silent Lin Jing from the side. Perhaps it was the experiences of the past few years that changed him, or perhaps she had never known the real him.
The unpleasant conversation that day and the overlapping faces of Lin Jing and Shao Lan made her secretly think during the sleepless nights that perhaps, during these years when there was no news, he was not feeling well either.
She had never heard him mention his father, only saying that he was busy. When he occasionally mentioned his mother, he never called her "Mom," but just called her by her name—Shao Lan.
Come to think of it, when they were close, she had never cared about his life. Instead, he was the one who showed care in every little detail.
I used to be too naive, too complacent, and too idealistic.
"What about you? How have you been these past few years?"
"It wasn't very good at the beginning, but I'm getting better and better. So--" Li Yaya left the sentence half-finished, so, you have to be better too.
The tears have long dried up.
"After my father passed away, I left Huanshan. On the one hand, I had to work to pay off my debts, and on the other hand, I always felt that Huanshan was a sad place. His figure is everywhere here. I walked along the mountain roads here, step by step to where I am today. I always feel that fate is unfair. I lost my mother when I was young and my father when I just became an adult. Why did I have to go through all this? I couldn't figure it out. Later, I stopped myself from thinking about it, because this world is inherently unfair." Li Yaya's tone was heavy and light. "Maybe it's because I stood in the rain for too long, and even the dampness became part of my skin. Then I told myself not to think about things I can't figure out, and not to become obsessed with things I can't do. Let the unfinished story stop forever at the semicolon line--"
——Let the unfinished story stop forever at the semicolon line.
After Li Yaya finished speaking, she glanced at the time. It was already late at night. She stood up and dusted off her clothes. "It's getting late. I should go back and rest."
After taking two steps, Lin Jing's voice called out to him, "Li Yaya."
Li Yaya stopped where she was but didn't look back.
"Li Yaya, can you please give me a chance?" Lin Jing's tone was filled with a hint of pleading. He wasn't asking her to love him, nor was he asking her to stay by his side, but simply asking her to give him a chance.
"I'll be staying in Huanshan for a few more days. If you have time, let's have a meal together. Let's have a good meal together this time."
Just like in high school, we were focused, chatting and laughing, and just eating.
"good."
Li Yaya gradually walked away, leaving only Lin Jing still there.
The next morning, Li Yaya went to her aunt's house and brought the breakfast she used to eat on the street.
The owner of the breakfast shop, who looked much the same, recognized Li Yaya immediately and pushed a few more soup dumplings into her mouth. He asked why she hadn't seen him for so long, considering he'd grown up. Li Yaya smiled, said nothing more, thanked him, and took her breakfast to her aunt's house.
When I got to my aunt's house, she had already bought breakfast, the same soup dumplings from the same restaurant.
The cousin looked at Li Yaya holding the buns and said, "My mom asked me to buy buns this morning, saying you like them. I didn't think much of it, but now that I see you holding them, I know you really like them."
After breakfast, my aunt and uncle went out to work. Working in a small county town, it was good enough to have a day off.
After a while, only grandma, Yaya, and cousin were left at home.
Near noon, my cousin waved his hand and said he would take the two of them out to eat.
The three of them slowly set off towards the mall - the place where Li Yaya and Lin Jing often drank milk tea together in high school. However, there were now more and more milk tea shops around the mountain.
The commercial center of the small county town is concentrated in those few places, so it is indeed small.
It is so small that you can encounter it anywhere.
Li Yaya didn't expect that she would see Lin Jing again and also bump into Guozi. Guozi's full name is Zhang Wenguo. Before sitting at the same table with Lin Jing, they had always sat together.
Lin Jing didn't come back to Huanshan alone, he was with his classmates, and they basically had their three meals a day nearby.
The moment their eyes met, Li Yaya greeted them. Her cousin asked who they were, but before she could reply, this high school classmate walked straight towards them. Li Yaya had no choice but to introduce them, "This is my high school classmate, Lin Jing. This is my grandma and my cousin."
It turns out this is her cousin!
He was narrow-minded, and his mind seemed to always be thinking about such things. He laughed at himself in his heart, "Lin Jing, a person with a dirty heart like you really doesn't deserve others' love."
Perhaps sensing something was amiss in Lin Jing's eyes, the cousin said he'd take grandma to a restaurant first and told Li Yaya to come over after she finished talking. Actually, there wasn't much to say. Li Yaya just said she was going to eat and arranged a time via WeChat, which Lin Jing agreed to.
The people traveling with Lin Jing were a man and a woman. The man had never seen Li Yaya, and the woman was Zhao Ziyi.
Zhao Ziyi's expression remained normal, but her subconsciously clenched fist betrayed her current displeasure. This Li Yaya, why is she everywhere she goes?
Lin Jing came back and asked, "Have you decided what to eat?"
"I haven't decided yet, but I think the one they went to should be good. Let's go there." Without giving the two a chance to speak, Zhao Ziyi walked straight towards the store where Li Yaya was.
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