Chapter 78 Come back with me, I won’t give up on you
Fortunately, Zhang Lin's residential complex wasn't so strict as to install an electric grid; instead, they'd simply sprinkled a dense layer of green anti-theft glass shards along the top of the wall. This glass shard couldn't hold Zhu Yingning back. In a flash, she scurried up a tree beside the wall, clambered on its branches to reach the top, and then, precariously, tiptoed inward, landing neatly on the ground.
Based on the address in the notebook, she found Zhang Lin's building, D02.
There was an elevator in the building. She followed the map and came to Zhang Lin's door. She adjusted her appearance in front of their glass door before pressing the doorbell.
The door was opened by a thin, middle-aged woman who resembled Zhang Lin. She suspected she was Zhang Lin's mother and quickly explained her purpose, saying she was Xu Sirui's friend and had come to inquire about his whereabouts. The woman, wary and suspicious, eyed her up and down, seemingly unconvinced. Finally, she said, "He and our A-Lin are both out. They're out having fun. Come back another day."
But she didn't have the luxury of asking for another day. Seeing that the other party had no intention of inviting her in, she had to compromise and said, "Okay, I'll wait outside. Will they be back tonight?"
The woman didn't answer the question of whether they would be back tonight. She wrinkled her nose and said, "Don't wait at our door. Go to the side." She raised her hand and pointed to the stairwell. "Go there."
Zhu Yingning did not refute and went to the stairwell with her schoolbag on her back.
The stairwell windows couldn't be opened; the thick frosted glass blocked out the sunlight, leaving the stairwell cold and dim. She walked in, and the voice-activated light came on, but soon went out, leaving behind a pale blue, a shadow of the dusk outside. Unable to write, with no room for creativity, she pulled her vocabulary notebook from her bag and, standing by the window, began to memorize words in the twilight, like a firefly reflecting the snow.
external, external. shadow, shadow. fight a losing battle, fight a losing battle.
Whenever the elevator door opened, ding-dong, she would stick her head out to see who was coming in. Occasionally, someone would pass by in the stairwell, and perhaps seeing that she was unfamiliar, they would give her an extra glance.
She waited for hours until it was completely dark. Without any electronic devices, she had no idea of the exact time, relying solely on sound and smell. The sizzling of frying pans and the aroma of cooking wafting from the houses indicated it was between six and seven, while the chime of the washing machine and the aroma of laundry detergent meant it was probably past nine.
Later, everything was quiet. Whether in the elevator or the stairwell, the footsteps coming and going became increasingly sparse.
She crouched on a staircase, her head almost nudging her knees, when she finally heard the elevator chime again, followed by the shuffling of footsteps. Zhang Lin said, "My parents are probably asleep. Be gentle and don't wake them." Xu Sirui responded lazily, her voice barely nasal, "Hmm."
She burst out of the stairwell, and at that moment, she felt like a monster from Ultraman's universe about to attack the Earth. Zhang Lin was so frightened by her that he almost fell to the ground. He forgot that he had just reminded Xu Sirui to speak softly and cursed, "You stalker!"
Zhu Yingning ignored the accomplice who harbored Xu Sirui. She looked at Xu Sirui. He reeked of alcohol, and if it weren't for his face, he'd look like a random homeless person. The alcohol slowed his reaction, his eyes narrowed, and his vision was slightly cloudy. Fortunately, he wasn't so drunk that he couldn't recognize her, because his face tightened the moment he saw her clearly.
"Come back with me," she said, not in a forceful tone, but not in a negotiating tone either.
He said slowly, "Where to go?" His speech was much slower than usual.
"go home."
Xu Sirui laughed and muttered to himself, "Where do I have a home?"
If he were sober, he certainly wouldn't have said such sour words. Zhu Yingning felt helpless and soft-hearted. She reached out to pull him back, but Zhang Lin jumped out and interrupted her. He looked like a stepmother who resented Snow White, or a hen protecting her chicks, and said impatiently, "Can you please stop bothering him? He doesn't want to see you."
Zhu Yingning pondered endlessly. Everyone truly had their own way of treating others well. Take Zhang Lin, for example. He treated Xu Sirui with pure protectiveness, unconditionally accommodating his capricious demands to anyone he considered a friend. A friend wanted to drink? He'd drink with them. A friend wanted to skip class? He'd silently support them. A friend wanted to avoid seeing someone? He'd chase them away.
She didn't approve of his handling of the situation, but she was inexplicably touched. Although Xu Sirui had fallen flat on his face with Feng Da, both Sun Mingyuan and Zhang Lin were treating him well in their own ways. He still had friends who truly cared about him.
However, despite being touched, she insisted on not agreeing with Zhang Lin's behavior. As they were about to enter the house, she tugged at the shoulder strap of her schoolbag, and seeing Xu Sirui's strong self-esteem, she said, "Xu Sirui, if you continue to stay here, you will cause trouble for Zhang Lin's parents."
As expected, Xu Sirui paused as he walked inside, and his expression became a little stiff.
Zhang Lin, who was standing next to him, exploded when he heard this: "Fuck! Don't talk nonsense. It's not your turn to guess what my parents' attitude is!" As he said that, he reached out and pulled Xu Sirui in, glaring at her hostilely, as if she were some kind of monster.
Zhu Yingning said to Xu Sirui who was standing behind the door, "I'll wait for you outside." After a moment's thought, she added calmly, "Until you come out."
"Wait as long as you want, no one cares." Zhang Lin slammed the door shut unceremoniously.
The corridor was once again completely silent.
**
Zhu Yingning didn't have the word "quit halfway" in her vocabulary. Since she had said she would wait, she would definitely wait. This time, she sat cross-legged at the door of Zhang Lin's house, using the corridor light from their doorway to study while waiting.
Because of her awkward posture and her slow brain at night, she struggled to finish her homework. It took her ages to finish, and she nearly fell asleep in her workbook. She tried to use the position of the stars in the night sky to tell the time, but when she looked up, she saw that Beijing's sky was so heavily light-polluted that she couldn't see many stars. She could only sit on the ground in front of the door, flipping through her textbook to while away the time.
Time seems to stretch infinitely while waiting.
Zhu Yingning didn't know how much time had passed. She suspected she'd dozed off again, leaning against the wall. Anyway, she was awakened by the sound of a door opening. The sky was barely dawning, almost blue, when the door to Zhang Lin's house opened a crack, and Xu Sirui emerged like a ghost. Dark circles were visible under his eyes, and his face was tinged with the dullness of a hangover, evidently a sleepless night. It seemed her words, "It would cause trouble for Zhang Lin's parents," had left him with considerable psychological pressure.
He floated out without looking at her and walked straight to the elevator.
Zhu Yingning got up from the ground and followed him with her schoolbag on her back.
They entered the elevator together.
The elevator wall reflected his and her faces, and Zhu Yingning realized that her complexion was no better than Xu Sirui's. After a night without a good night's rest, they looked like two zombies just dug out of a Qing Dynasty tomb, each more haggard than the other. No one spoke in the elevator, only the sound of tired breathing.
After leaving the community gate, Xu Sirui did not hail a taxi, nor did he say where he was going. He stopped at the door for a few minutes, and then chose a direction like a headless fly.
She followed without a word.
After walking for a while, I could see the shadow of the South Moat in the distance, and the smell of water was floating in the air.
In the area near Longtan Lake Park, in the summer, you can often see many citizens diving, swimming, or kayaking in the southeast corner of the moat. In the winter, some people go ice skating on the ice. Of course, due to safety concerns, the relevant departments always discourage this, but the people's passion for the water cannot be resisted, and every year there are people who knowingly do it. Now it is autumn, the weather is neither hot enough for swimming nor cold enough for skating. It is a deserted morning. Only an old man, shirt off, exposing the white skin on his sagging belly, stands on the steps of the water outlet and does exaggerated warm-up exercises.
Zhu Yingning is not sure whether the old man will be fined for his behavior. She still has many unknowns about Beijing.
She followed Xu Sirui, walking along the river bank with her head down. The cool breeze in the early morning blew into the collar of her thin school uniform, freezing her limbs into four popsicles.
After walking for an unknown amount of time, Xu Sirui suddenly stopped, turned around to look at her, and finally opened his mouth and asked, "What do you want to do?"
She rubbed her cold nose and said, "I hope you come home."
"I'm not going back." Xu Sirui looked like he wanted to be angry with her, or even scold her, but he was too tired, both physically and mentally, to be angry. He could only say without any deterrent effect, "Get out."
Zhu Yingning then expressed her insistence without any deterrent effect: "I won't, unless you come back with me."
"I'm not going back."
"Then I'll always follow you."
"Are you sick?"
"No."
"What on earth can you do to stop pestering me?"
"I don't know." She emphasized, "But I won't give up on you, Xu Sirui."
"I beg you to give me up."
"don't want."
They were carrying on a meaningless conversation, moving forward as they went. Just when Xu Sirui thought this meaningless conversation would continue, there was a sudden silence behind him.
If he disappeared somewhere else, it would be fine, but this was the riverside after all. Xu Sirui didn't want to pay any attention to it, so he quickened his pace and walked forward, but he became more and more nervous. Looking back, he saw Zhu Yingning and the old man standing together, shouting something towards the direction of the moat.
He walked back quickly and saw a naughty kid sitting on a swimming ring on the surface of the moat, with his butt stuck in the hole in the middle, floating on the surface of the river.
Xu Sirui: “…”
Where on earth did this kid come from? And what was he thinking of diving into the water like that?
This posture makes it impossible to exert force and the child can only go with the flow. At first, the naughty kid thought it was fun and laughed happily. But when he found that he could not control the direction and could neither go down nor up, he panicked, the smile on his face shattered, and he burst into tears.
The old man said, "Baby, don't move, don't move! Don't move! I'm going to save you right away!"
While he was speaking, Zhu Yingning had quickly taken off her shoes and socks, apparently wanting to get into the water before the old man.
Xu Sirui's trigeminal nerve was throbbing. He ran forward in two steps and pulled her back.
Zhu Yingning looked at him in astonishment: "Xu Sirui, don't mess around..."
"Who's messing around?!" He couldn't help but yell at her, and he wanted to take a mirror to let her see her current appearance clearly.
Although he suffered from insomnia, he still stayed in Zhang Lin's bed for a whole night. She spent the whole night in the corridor and seemed to be on the verge of sudden death at any time. Xu Sirui had no doubt that he would let her jump down. In an hour, he could buy a bamboo mat to collect her body.
"Stay still!" He yelled at her and was about to go down when he heard a plop—
While they were arguing, the old man had already jumped into the water nimbly.
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