White mice (Part 3)
Perhaps due to excessive exercise, Zhou Zeyu slept very soundly, his mind was blank, and he had a few unclear dreams. He buried himself in the quilt and did not move at all, not even noticing how long his phone had been buzzing.
So when she finally opened her eyes slowly and realized she had missed four calls, the remaining sleepiness in her head immediately vanished, and she jumped out of bed to check her call log.
The first person she dialed was Coach Xu. Without thinking, she immediately called back. The call was answered right away, and Coach Xu's voice sounded a little resentful and anxious: "Didn't you tell your parents about what happened abroad?"
Zhou Zeyu fell silent, unsure how to defend himself, or rather, unable to defend himself at all. He could only slowly utter an "ah," taking it as an admission.
Coach Xu seemed to have anticipated her reaction. He sighed and said helplessly, "I guessed you wouldn't tell, and I was right. A media outlet found out about you yesterday and published the story this morning. Your parents probably saw it. Think carefully about how to tell them."
“Director Xu,” Zhou Zeyu said, lowering his head, “I really don’t know what to say.”
A heavy sigh came from the phone, "I know, if you really can't handle it, just push it onto me, I'll take care of it."
Zhou Zeyu shook her head, then quickly said no need after realizing what she meant. It was something she should handle herself; she couldn't always let others clean up her messes. Besides, Coach Xu couldn't take care of everything for her forever, and she couldn't trouble him any further.
After hanging up, she started scrolling down the remaining missed calls, and without a doubt, both were from her parents.
Actually, she had thought about talking to her parents about her recent troubles and her perhaps somewhat rash decisions. But every time she was about to make a call, childhood memories would involuntarily surface in her mind, leaving her with countless undelivered calls.
She ultimately didn't call back, but instead edited a text message and sent it to each of them. She spent a long time revising and deliberating on the content, and before she knew it, three hours had passed.
The text message contained a lot of information, about her injury and the reasons for her temporary retirement. It was a long and detailed message, but it deliberately obscured the fact that she was in a slump and had not been selected for the national team again.
Regardless of her current situation, she doesn't want to ruin her parents' image of her. They would worry, and perhaps be disappointed, neither of which she wants to see.
At the end of the text message, she inquired about their recent situations, asking how her mother's clothing store business was doing, and also asking about her father, aunt, and little sister's health. She chatted about this and that for a few minutes, but in general, it was all unimportant.
After all, she has rarely contacted her parents since their divorce, and she often relies on social media to find out about them, but she hasn't paid attention to them for a long time.
Family ties need time to maintain, but since she joined the provincial team, she has been away from home and can only go back a handful of times a year. Her parents are always busy with their careers and don't have time to visit her. The family can only have a meal together during the Spring Festival, and even this rare reunion meal is always rushed.
She lacked nothing materially; her parents always sent her a fixed amount of money every month, but it was of little use. Many times, she would secretly envy Fang Xiaocan, whose parents would always find ways to see her by the fence, bringing her homemade braised pork or souvenirs from their travels, but she never received any of that.
Because they were going through a huge divorce battle at that time, fighting tooth and nail for custody, they left her alone with Coach Xu and ignored her for almost half a year.
In fact, her childhood was very happy. Her father would take her to the Youth Palace to learn ball games on his bicycle, her mother would proudly plaster her award certificates all over the living room, and the whole family would take photos together at the entrance of the Bird's Nest. It was all so perfect, but somehow it has become so unfamiliar.
How could she not be sad? It was impossible for her not to be sad. She was only a teenager at the time. Several times she secretly cried under the covers because she missed home, but she didn't dare to call home. She could only bury it in her heart. As a result, she didn't know what to say when she saw her parents. She became more and more silent and simply stopped talking to them.
She lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling for a while without moving, sighed, picked up her phone again, and still didn't reply.
Feeling somewhat disappointed, she got out of bed, slowly dressed and washed up, and aimlessly strolled to the doorway. The sun was bright, and she could only squint at the distance.
There wasn't much to see, really. After all, even the most beautiful scenery gets boring if you look at it every day. She yawned and prepared to go back inside, but out of the corner of her eye, she vaguely saw a figure slowly approaching on the path.
The man nodded to her as a greeting, then walked into her small storage room as if no one else was there. He skillfully took out his bicycle key from his pocket, tossed his swimming cap into his pocket, and rode his bike to a steady stop at the door.
Zhou Zeyi chuckled twice: "You're being a little too familiar."
Sorkov remained noncommittal: "Well, I was its previous owner, so get in the car."
"Wait a minute..." She looked at the other person suspiciously and asked cautiously, "Are you going to learn to swim again?"
Sorkov pursed his lips, said nothing, but gestured for her to sit down.
"No." As if knowing what she wanted to say, Solkov decisively ended her sentence.
She resigned herself to her fate and sat on the back of the bicycle. The bicycle seemed to be quite old, with the seat making a slight creaking sound. Solkov slowly pedaled, the chain rubbing against the pedals with the dullness characteristic of a bicycle with its rust.
It seems like that's how it's always portrayed in those youth dramas: the male and female leads riding bicycles along tree-lined paths. Zhou Zeyu thought it was incredibly beautiful back then, and couldn't help but fantasize about such scenes. However, as things stand, the two of them definitely don't fit into that romantic situation.
It was true that Sorkov rode very slowly, but correspondingly, the creaking bicycle was quite unstable. Fearing that he might accidentally throw Zhou Zeyu off, he could only choose the most stable and also the least aesthetically pleasing method: he spread his legs wide and clung tightly to the small back seat, gritting his teeth and nervously maintaining his balance.
However, the culprit remained completely unfazed, continuing to ride despite her protests, even making terrifyingly sudden stops at traffic lights. This made the scene not only anything but romantic, but also somewhat inexplicably humorous.
After a bumpy ride, when the two finally arrived at the stadium entrance after overcoming numerous obstacles, Zhou Zeyu felt as if he was about to throw up the breakfast he had just eaten.
Especially after being pulled into the deep water again.
She even suspected she might have some kind of psychological disorder, such as thalassophobia, feeling nauseous and wanting to vomit when she was in deep water, or experiencing darkness. However, Sorkov bluntly told her that she was exaggerating and that it would be more realistic to just release the float.
Zhou Zeyu could only laugh it off and helplessly glanced around. He then saw a boy slowly walking past him. The boy went up to Sorkov and the two seemed to know each other. They whispered a few words to each other. The more Zhou Zeyu looked, the more uneasy he felt, because Sorkov visibly became malicious.
She clung tightly to the float, staring warily at the other person. "What are you doing?"
Sorkov shrugged and put on his swimming goggles. "It's nothing."
After saying that, he suddenly dove into the water without warning and dived to the bottom of the pool. Zhou Zeyu looked down at the blurry shadow in the water, wondering what he was up to.
However, she soon found out.
She was consumed by rage and even wanted to punch him. As she thought about it, she unconsciously let go of the float and tried to turn around, but as you can imagine, she fell into the water again with a splash.
This time, however, Solkov caught her in time. Perhaps having learned from his previous kick, he wisely chose to grab her hand and, after she struggled wildly and splashed water all over his face, shouted, "Relax!"
Zhou Zeyu closed her eyes, trying hard to recall the scenes of her usually slacking off in the corner. It was this feeling of relaxation that she kept telling herself.
After each physical test or high-intensity running exercise, she and Fang Xiaocan would find a secluded spot to relax for a while. They would lie sprawled on the floor tiles, their arms behind their heads, their muscles completely relaxed. They would whisper some random chatter, laughing and joking for a while, forgetting all their worries and secretly enjoying their hard-won leisure time.
It's inevitable that Coach Xu would occasionally discover them, since he had already figured out where they were hiding. In Coach Xu's words, "he knows where they're going as soon as they step out of the water." The words may be crude, but the principle is sound.
However, despite saying that, Coach Xu never stopped them. At first, he would nag them a bit to not sleep on the ground, but later he simply let it go and even humorously recalled the embarrassing incident of being caught climbing over the wall to play years ago.
Lost in his memories, Zhou Zeyu couldn't help but laugh out loud, only to realize that he was floating steadily on the water.
"It's a success!"
Sorkov didn't speak, but let out a loud groan. Zhou Zeyu looked at him strangely, then realized that he was still holding onto the other's hand tightly. He quickly let go, but as soon as he let go, he sank down again.
She swallowed several mouthfuls of pool water, then thrashed around until she could grab onto the edge of the pool. Looking apologetically at Sorkov's red hands, she said, "How about we just pretend we're floating? What's next?"
Sorkov glanced at her guilty expression, hesitated for a moment, then shook his head. "Alright, let's try another one."
Then came a bunch of miscellaneous exercises. Zhou Zeyu studied very diligently, but she probably didn't have the potential to learn to swim, and her progress was too slow. The two of them spent a long time in the pool trying to figure it out until dark, and she could only manage to do simple leg kicks.
Fortunately, Sorkov was very supportive. Although he still had that perpetually expressionless face, he would praise her every few minutes. At first, Zhou Zeyu thought he was exaggerating, but after watching for a while, she found that he was indeed very sincere. She gradually gained some confidence and decided to learn it no matter what.
She sat in the familiar back seat again, her hair half-dry and still a little damp, hanging down her shoulders. Too tired to speak, she stared blankly at his back. "Thank you."
Sorkov didn't speak, and she couldn't see his expression. After a while, he hummed in response, sounding quite pleased.
Something hard was pressing against the side of her jeans. Zhou Zeyu pulled out her phone with some difficulty. As soon as the screen lit up, she saw two text messages from her parents. They were better than she had expected. There wasn't much blame or complaint. In fact, neither of them mentioned the matter much. The only thing they repeatedly emphasized was that she shouldn't pay attention to what was said online.
Her expression was complicated. She silently turned off her phone, turned her head to look at the dim streetlights along the roadside, and suddenly felt very uncomfortable.
"What's wrong?"
Sorkov gave an "oh" and didn't ask any more questions, leaving Zhou Zeyu staring suspiciously at his back, wondering if he had an eye in the back as well.
"I have a question for you," she began hesitantly, "Do you care a lot about what other people think?"
“Basically not,” he said without hesitation.
"basically?"
“If it’s a stranger, of course you don’t need to care,” he paused, as if thinking about something. “One person’s evaluation of another is easily misled and interfered with by the outside world.”
"So, you don't need to worry about it too much."
His last words were spoken very softly, so softly that it seemed like he was talking to himself, yet they sounded so sincere that they sounded less like words of comfort and more like words of encouragement.
"Then how can I stop caring?"
Sorkov pondered for a long time this time, even slowing down his cycling speed. She found that he was a very focused person, and when he got serious, he could even seem a bit obsessive. So the two of them moved slowly like this, as if time had stood still.
“It may be difficult to ignore it sometimes,” he said slowly. “Some people rely on habit, some rely on blocking it out, and some people may simply not be able to ignore it.”
Zhou Zeyu looked at the back of his head, "Which one are you?"
“It’s a habit,” he said succinctly, then paused for three seconds before continuing, “because the only option is to ignore it.”
"Get used to it? That would be too difficult."
"Because so many people hate me, I've gotten used to it." He said quietly, seemingly stating a fact with feigned calmness, but Zhou Zeyu felt there was a hint of resentment in his words, and a slight teasing in the resentment, like a lame joke.
She seemed to have gotten used to this guy's unexpected humor, and belatedly responded, "It's not because your face is too sour, is it?"
“Maybe,” he shrugged, saying nonchalantly, “but I guess it’s mainly because I hate them more than they hate me.”
Zhou Zeyu laughed, and it seemed that Sorkov laughed too, but she couldn't see his face. She could only faintly hear his soft laughter. The two of them laughed silently, and then no one spoke again.
The streetlights on both sides of the road slowly swept past her eyes, blurring her vision in a slightly dazzling way. Zhou Zeyu closed her eyes, the coolness unique to early autumn brushing against her cheeks. She thought of those miscellaneous forums and comments, which were mostly a mix of good and evil, ranging from nonsense to extravagant praise, with all sorts of strange things.
Who in the world can be liked by everyone? She thought, probably no one. So the overwhelming criticism and ridicule were nothing. She had heard enough of them before. This was something a public figure should bear.
Coach Xu spoke so casually, saying it was just "reported by the media," but she knew it wasn't like that at all. Losing an international competition at her prime and retiring abroad would be a topic that could cause a huge uproar. She could almost guess what people would think of her; whether they called her a coward or a piece of trash, she would accept it.
She glanced down at her phone; the message screen was empty. Whether it was due to the blocking or her own imagination, it seemed as if all the negative messages had been crushed by the wheels of a car on the asphalt road.
The transition from pain to perhaps less pain is probably a form of getting used to.
Zhou Zeyu recalled Sorkov's words, "Because I hate them more," and couldn't help but laugh out loud again. He muttered to himself, "I hate them too."
She spoke so softly that no one but herself could hear her accusatory complaint. Perhaps only the wind heard it, but it wouldn't tell anyone, so it didn't matter.
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