Chapter 122 #2
He curled in on himself, trying hard to alleviate the discomfort churning in his stomach, but it was no use.
The pain soon spread to his chest. It felt as though someone had grabbed his heart and gripped it tight, squeezing it until it was about to burst. He couldn’t breathe.
Every time he tried, the pain would escape his chest and crawl along his nerves to the rest of his body.
His chest. His back. His arms…
I’m having a heart attack.
Do you have a heart condition, Jiang Cheng?
He laughed.
He laughed so hard that he couldn’t stop, even though he couldn’t hear his own voice. There was no sound left in him. He couldn’t even laugh out loud.
Eventually, the tears flowed.
Took him long enough.
He’d thought he wouldn’t cry. He was so numb and disoriented, he couldn’t fully absorb what had happened—he thought he’d be able to just carry on like this and get over it.
But he ended up crying anyway—outright sobbing, even.
Pussy.
There weren’t that many tears, truly. Jiang Cheng wiped his hand over his face. Maybe because there was no sound.
So this is what losing your voice feels like, he thought. Unable to laugh or cry out loud.
When his hand touched something soft, he opened his eyes. The teru teru bozu next to his pillow looked back at him, its black eyes shining bright.
In that instant, Jiang Cheng thought he might really have a breakdown. He pulled the doll into his arms and hugged it fiercely.
Aaaaah—!
He wanted to throw his entire body into crying out, to do it forcefully and loudly. Perhaps a completely dedicated wailing session was the only thing that could make him feel a little better.
But it was impossible; he could only hear a raspy rustle in his throat.
How unsatisfying.
How frustrating.
***
Jiang Cheng spent the whole night curled up in his bunk. He didn’t know whether he was awake or asleep. It was a chaotic night.
When he opened his eyes, he saw a small patch of sunlight on the wall in front of his bed. He stared at it for a long time.
“Jiang Cheng?” Zhao Ke’s voice rang out from below. “There’s congee. Come down and have some.”
Okay.
Jiang Cheng wanted to answer, but his voice still made no sound. In fact, it seemed even worse today.
He let out a soft sigh and slowly sat up.
His head was about to burst. The moment he sat upright, it felt like everything in and out of his body was weighing him down so heavily that he could hardly straighten his back.
The teru teru bozu was still in his arms, its eyes as bright as ever. He set it back beside his pillow. Then he withdrew his hand, thought for a second, and reached out again to give it two pats on the head.
When he climbed down from his bunk, Zhao Ke, who never cursed, took one look at him and exclaimed with utmost sincerity: “Fuck.”
Jiang Cheng touched his own face. He thought it felt all right; he didn’t sense anything out of the ordinary. Or…could he have developed a head of silver hair overnight? He swiftly pulled open his drawer and took out a small mirror to check his reflection.
His hair was still dark. Very good. It was certainly messy, though. His eyes were swollen, and his face looked grubby. Imprints from the creases on his pillow marked his skin, and he looked pretty terrible in a general sense, his complexion sallow.
He tossed the mirror back into the drawer and cleaned his face haphazardly with a wet wipe.
“Is your voice any better?” Zhao Ke asked, opening a takeout container on his desk.
Jiang Cheng cleared his throat and attempted an “ah,” but no sound came out. He shook his head, sat down at his desk, and accepted the spoon Zhao Ke offered him, scooping big spoonfuls of congee into his mouth.
“Do you still feel nauseous?” Zhao Ke asked, sitting down beside him.
Jiang Cheng shook his head.
“That’s good to hear. You scared us with the way you were vomiting yesterday. Lu Shi and Qiqi ran out last night and bought a bunch of medicine for nausea and bowel inflammation and all that.”
Jiang Cheng turned and gave him a little smile.
“You should see the way you smiled just now.” Zhao Ke sighed. “If I take a photo and post it, I bet your name will never show up on the confession page ever again.”
Jiang Cheng lowered his head and cackled at his food in complete silence—like a tickled mime.
“You should take time off from class today,” Zhao Ke told him. “Use the morning to rest.”
Jiang Cheng shook his head.
Zhao Ke looked at him. “No time off?”
Jiang Cheng shook his head.
“…A half day should be okay, right?”
Jiang Cheng tapped a few times on his phone and showed him the screen.
- I can’t stop
“…Whatever you say, I guess.” Zhao Ke glanced at him and stood up. “Hurry up and eat, then. It’s a big lecture today. We’ll have to squish in the back again if we’re late.”
It could have been the poor sleep he had the night before, but Jiang Cheng was unsteady on his feet as he went to wash up. The soles of his slippers felt fluffier than ever before.
As he washed his face, he started to feel much more awake.
However, when he straightened up and the beads of cool water disappeared from his cheeks, he sank back into a haze once again.
As he followed Zhao Ke to the lecture, he felt like he was wading through fog the entire way.
He couldn’t see or hear clearly, and the ground felt soft beneath his feet. It was as if he was hung over.
Zhao Ke turned back to him. “Do you need me to hold you steady?”
Jiang Cheng laughed as he mouthed, Fuck off.
“I don’t like getting into other people’s business, but…” Zhao Ke slowed down and walked beside Jiang Cheng. “If you really want to talk to someone about it, I can always listen.”
Jiang Cheng pointed at his own throat.
“I mean when you can speak again,” said Zhao Ke.
Jiang Cheng nodded.
He didn’t want to talk. He didn’t want to say anything. He didn’t want to mention this in front of anyone right now. He couldn’t bring himself to think about it—refused to think about it.
About why Gu Fei did that. About what Gu Fei was feeling when he said those words.
Why .
Why?
Why would a person who’d once said “I’m right here behind you” suddenly say words like that?
Cold and composed, leaving no room for negotiation.
Why?
I don’t have a home anymore, Gu Fei.
But it’ll be all right as long as I have you. You’re family.
The feeling of losing everything, of not having anything concrete within his reach—it was more than he could bear.
***
The lecture hall was already filled with students when they arrived. Lu Shi waved at them, and they squeezed their way over to the seats he’d saved.
“You sure you’re okay, Jiang Cheng?” Zhang Qiqi turned around from his seat in the row in front of them. “You look terrible.”
Jiang Cheng shook his head. He took out his textbook, opened it, and started to read.
An Introduction to Economic Law . Those five words were all he could read—everything else was incomprehensible. He closed his eyes. Only when the professor began speaking did he open his eyes again, forcing himself to concentrate on the lecture.
Normally he could focus no matter what else was going on around him, but he wasn’t so successful today. He could barely try to concentrate on the lecture for a single minute before his mind would start wandering. He had no choice but to close his eyes again, adjust his breathing, and reopen them.
It didn’t take very long for these attempts to wear him out. The exhaustion weighed so heavily on him that he felt like his body would sink straight down through the chair, past the floor, and into the deepest depths of the earth.
He’d been planning to stick it out for at least one class, then go back to the dorm to sleep afterward if he had to, but his stomach had started hurting again.
When had he become so delicate? He pressed his hand against his stomach.
Oh, Contestant Jiang Cheng is so fragile right now. He can’t withstand any damage! From the looks of it, if he doesn’t adjust himself soon, it’s gonna get real bad!
Jiang Cheng didn’t make it to the end of class. The intense nausea overwhelmed him again, except there were things in his stomach to be puked out now.
He stood up with one hand on his stomach, striding straight over Zhao Ke’s seat into the aisle because he couldn’t wait for him to make room. As his foot landed on the floor, he felt a rush of weakness from the churning in his guts.
“Do you need to puke?” Zhao Ke asked quietly, giving him a hand.
Jiang Cheng didn’t have time to answer as he doubled over and jogged toward the door.
He hadn’t made it two steps when he realized that it wasn’t going to end well. The feeling of total fatigue he’d felt yesterday, after vomiting his guts out, suddenly surfaced again, and it abruptly felt impossible to take another step.
Fuck.
As his left foot tripped over his right and his whole body pitched forward in a downward arc, he thought about how interesting his life was.
Look, everyone! What a rare sight! In a hall full of people, Contestant Jiang Cheng performs an amazing axel twist mid-run!
***
“Didn’t you have an old cell phone?” Gu Fei’s mom asked as she rummaged through the drawers in the living room. “Where’d you put it? Why don’t you use that one for now?”
“It’s okay,” said Gu Fei.
“Then what will you use?” His mom turned to him.
“I don’t need a phone anymore.”
“You…” She looked as though she was about to say something, but a few seconds passed, and she didn’t manage to get it out.
Gu Fei had class today. He glanced at the clock on the wall. He’d be late unless he left soon.
If he was late, so be it. Or maybe he should just skip the class.
Sitting unmoving on the couch, he watched Gu Miao as she leaned over the coffee table, drawing away.
Gu Miao had been very quiet for the past few days, interacting very little with other people, whether through body language or eye contact.
She hardly went out on her skateboard, either.
She’d been drawing all day instead: rows upon rows of green bunnies.
She’d already accumulated a stack of bunny-filled pages beside her, and the pile only continued to grow.
Gu Fei stood up and went back to his room.
There was a camera lens on his desk. Ding Zhuxin had bought it for him. It was even better than the one he’d had before.
He still hadn’t thrown away the old lens with the shattered glass, though he wasn’t sure why he’d kept it or what it was still good for. It was like that with many things—kept around without knowing why, but kept nonetheless. The pile of colorful phosphorescent bricks in his closet, for example.
Gu Fei closed the windows and the door and pulled the curtains tight. Once his room dimmed down, he opened the door of his closet and pulled up a chair to sit in front of it, holding a lit cigarette between his lips.
He stared at the section of the closet that had been cleared of clothes and now contained a few neatly stacked piles of bricks.
Three cigarettes later, Gu Miao knocked on his door.
Gu Fei stood up, closed the closet door, and opened the curtains and windows. As the northerly wind swept in, he closed his eyes and took in a deep breath.
Gu Miao stood outside the door with a sheet of paper in her hand. When he opened the door, she handed the paper to him.
It was a recently finished page of green bunnies.
“Looking good,” said Gu Fei.
Gu Miao turned, went back to her spot by the coffee table, and continued to draw.
“I’m going out for a while.” Gu Fei carefully folded the sheet of paper and placed it beside his pillow, then picked up the camera on his desk. “If I’m not back by noon, go to the store and have lunch without me.”
Gu Miao didn’t respond; her attention was focused on drawing.
Gu Fei glanced at her, then opened the door and walked out.
It was snowing.
Quite heavily, in fact. By the looks of it, the snow had been falling for a while. He just hadn’t noticed. No wonder Gu Miao didn’t go out to play on her skateboard.
He tightened his scarf and yanked the hood of his down jacket over his head. His hand trembled ever so slightly as he pulled the zipper up.
“Let’s get two, couples’ style. What do you think?” Jiang Cheng said from beside him.
A few seconds later, Gu Fei turned to go back in. He dug out another jacket and changed into it before heading out again.
He didn’t take his bike or his motorcycle, nor the little dumpling car. Camera bag in hand, he let his feet carry him slowly down the street.
This place hadn’t changed much in the past few decades. Not even the streets had been widened for more traffic. There were countless marks across every inch of the ground, every wall. With every step you took, every glance you cast, you saw marks left behind by people who had come and gone.