Aju’s chatter came to an abrupt halt as he let out a startled “Ah,” instinctively looking in the direction Jiang Ran had left. He thought she had left rather abruptly…
But then again.
“She’s probably still angry at you. All that talk about touching her, you’re just being paranoid and overthinking it.”
“No, that’s not it.”
The boy murmured almost to himself. Vaguely, he remembered that in the ambulance, she had said something to him, in a terrifying tone.
But at the time, his head hurt too much, and the machines made too much noise for him to hear clearly.
“Even if she doesn’t want you touching her for now, isn’t that perfectly understandable?” Aju glanced at him. “Tell me, what exactly were you thinking this time?”
Beijiao hadn’t really thought about it.
If previously going off-piste skiing in Xinjiang could result in hitting rocks, getting lost, or falling into unknown terrain, this time climbing the mountain with that group was purely an act of not thinking at all—
The ski resort had only stopped operating for three or four days. They had climbed up along the original trail, which had no protruding large rocks or risk of getting lost. If it weren’t for that fat guy’s clumsiness, no one would have fallen into a roadside pit.
As for crashing into a tree, according to the original plan, they were supposed to climb to the summit and then slowly ski down. There would have been no chance of hitting a tree.
Originally, there wouldn’t have been so many problems. Jiang Ran had said no, and he had agreed, but still wanted to play, so he thought it better to avoid trouble and secretly went without telling her.
What followed was a chain of incidents turning into an accident. Each unexpected situation pushed things toward a worse outcome, catching him off guard. On the way down the mountain, he realized how stupid he had been—
Why couldn’t he have just played?
He could have cuddled on her lap, acting cute, saying he just wanted to go hiking and skiing. Wouldn’t she have definitely accompanied him?
Such a trivial matter—every day in the group chat, people organized hiking and skiing trips. Essentially, it wasn’t that dangerous. She had even taken a helicopter to ski down real mountains before, with rich experience. For her, what danger could there be in a half-wild trail with fresh snow on top of machine-compacted snow?
All those analyses he had rambled on about—the risks, the safety—how could she not have already thought of them?
He was so stupid.
But it was too late to say any of that now.
Beijiao sat like a mute, sinking back onto the bed like a limp, lifeless dog.
Aju poured steaming hot porridge from a thermos. The aroma of food filled the entire hospital room. Lixingnan’s cooking was always good, though he was usually too lazy to cook.
It had been a while since he had eaten a hot meal. Normally, his stomach should already be churning with hunger. Yet Beijiao showed no reaction. Sniffing slightly, he only thought despairingly: How annoying. There wasn’t much of her scent left in the hospital room to begin with, and now it was completely gone.
Aju said, “Eat something.”
He weakly turned his head away, frowning: “I don’t want to eat. Just let me starve to death.”
“If you die of starvation, you really won’t see Jiang Ran again.”
“It doesn’t matter. Even if I survive, I can’t see her… She won’t come. Sorry for the trouble these days. The people taking shifts watching over me might reduce from four to three.”
“…”
Holding the porridge bowl, Aju thought emotionlessly to himself: Was I this annoying when I was twenty-one? Probably not?
“You’ll be discharged in a few days. Do you know what happened outside during the time you were unconscious? Nationwide lockdown—within just one or two days, all public places stopped operating, and inter-provincial travel was suspended. A lockdown barrier was set up at the gate of our villa community, and we couldn’t even leave the residential area. To come to the hospital, we had to carry an official permit from the subdistrict office.” Aju said, “When you’re alive and discharged, you really will have to go home and face her.”
Beijiao turned his face back, looking somewhat bewildered.
“Unless she kicks you out to sleep in the storage room.”
Beijiao leaned forward and pecked the porridge from Aju’s spoon.
So, after Jiang Ran,
Aju also developed the idea: “I will absolutely never have a son in the future.”
…
After the surgery, Beijiao lay in bed for three days. Since it was only a fractured collarbone and a concussion, he wasn’t completely helpless. Basically, he could get out of bed and use the restroom by himself the next day.
Qiu Nian usually came during the day, and at night, Aju, Lixingnan, or Datou took turns staying overnight. Beijiao originally wanted to say that there was no need for someone to stay overnight since he didn’t really need help—
But he thought better of it and held back.
In his mind, he arranged a shift schedule for them and quietly waited for Jiang Ran to appear on the third night.
He took a shower and tidied himself up in the afternoon. By evening, when the door opened and it was Lixingnan, he fell silent.
“Your face says ‘Why are you here again,'” Lixingnan said expressionlessly, “Can’t you manage your expressions?”
He said that but didn’t turn to leave. Instead, he entered the room and sat down—
In recent days, everyone had been confined at home, not allowed to go out. There were news reports overseas about people walking their dogs eight times a day because they were only allowed outside for that reason…
Now they were somewhat similar, except they were going to the hospital to walk their dog.
Beijiao had no mood to hide his disappointment. He turned to Aju, as if silently saying: See? I told you she wouldn’t come.
Aju felt uncomfortable under his dog-like gaze and turned to Lixingnan: “So why are you here? Where’s Jiang Ran? Did she abandon her dog?”
“Jiang Ran said she has her period and her stomach hurts,” Lixingnan stretched out his long legs and relaxed in the chair. “Looks like it’ll take some time for her anger to subside.”
Aju asked Beijiao: “Have you apologized to her?”
Beijiao lifted the blanket with one hand, covering his head like a caterpillar burrowing back into the quilt: “I send her eight hundred little essays apologizing every day.”
“…Her phone was broken, and she didn’t even bother to buy a new one. What’s the point of sending her messages?” Aju said in disbelief, “Didn’t she stay with you when you woke up that day? Did you apologize to her then?”
“Not really.”
“You didn’t apologize?!”
“No, not that I wouldn’t apologize.” Beijiao pursed his lips. “It’s just that at the time, my reflex was that apologizing might only make her angrier—previously, I apologized after making mistakes, and she forgave me. This time, I don’t think an apology can fix it.”
“Then how do you fix it?”
Lixingnan chuckled lightly. Most of the time, he played the role of the “original carving master,” “a man equal to Jiang Ran,” and “the group’s parent.” Instinctively, Beijiao quite enjoyed competing with him—
Like on the slopes, he had to ski a little faster or do a few more runs than him.
Perhaps because he had never seen the boy in such a desperate state before, Lixingnan found it amusing now, “Break up?”
Beijiao lifted the quilt and sat up, glaring at him with a look of shock and resentment: “It’s not even the fifteenth day of the Lunar New Year. Can’t you speak more auspiciously?”
Aju laughed heartily beside him.
Lixingnan flipped through some magazines Jiang Ran had left earlier: “She said she wouldn’t break up with you.”
Beijiao’s eyes lit up.
“But that was before you got injured,” the man added, “Now it’s hard to say. Before, it was just about being disobedient and disappointing. Now look at you, metal pins in your body, concussion—you’ve really crossed Jiang Ran’s bottom line.”
His words fell like a mountain from the sky, crashing onto Beijiao’s heart, turning everything upside down.
Suddenly, he recalled something he had desperately tried to forget—what Jiang Ran had said to him in the ambulance.
She had really said something—
“If taking the red tree up the mountain was the third time.”
“Then recklessly speeding down the off-piste was the fourth.”
…
“If you knew you were wrong the third time, what were you thinking when you made the fourth mistake?”
In the ambulance, she had looked down at him, her face blurring, except for those dark brown pupils filled with sadness… Thinking of it now, it could kill him.
“Open the window,” Beijiao said, “I’ll jump down.”
His voice sounded genuinely heartfelt.
Aju and Lixingnan exchanged a look. Aju sighed and packed up to leave.
The room door clicked shut softly. Aju left, leaving only the sound of Lixingnan lazily flipping through magazines.
After a while, he heard the muffled voice from under the quilt calling his name. Without lifting his head, he said, “If you want something, get it yourself. Both your hands aren’t broken, are they?” Not hearing any movement for a while, he looked up curiously and found the boy had already sat up on the bed.
The boy gazed blankly out the window. Outside the hospital window, a bare tree was covered in snow and ice. Beijiao asked, “When Lin Shuang left, what was Aju thinking? Was he angry too?”
Lixingnan paused, then realized—this dog wasn’t completely devoid of emotional intelligence; he had at least a little tenderness—
He wanted to ask about that, but he knew he couldn’t ask Aju directly.
“The severity of the two situations can’t be compared,” Lixingnan said, resting his hand lightly on his thigh. “If Lin Shuang were still alive, all of us would be very angry with her, disappointed, and might even give her a severe scolding… but back then, we just hoped it was a nightmare that would wake up immediately.”
His voice became somewhat distant, drifting to the point that Beijiao’s heart sank.
“How did Aju move on?”
“Move on?”
Lixingnan’s tone slightly lifted at the end. After a pause, he slowly said.
“He didn’t.”
Aju had been following Lixingnan and Jiang Ran over the years. Although not as professional as the two, he was still a well-known figure in the skiing circle… and he looked good too, with a great background. Earlier, he had studied for a master’s degree at the University of Sydney—his intelligence was up to standard, and his emotional intelligence was at least passable—
With such a basic setup, he remained single, a real prize wherever he went—
But over the years, aside from Qiu Nian and Jiang Ran, he hardly spoke much to other girls…
Dating was out of the question. He could joke around, but when it came to serious relationships, he became as indifferent as someone ready to become a monk the next second.
Everyone around him saw this but didn’t say anything. They didn’t know what to say, only hoping time would make things better—
Although judging from the current situation, there seemed to be no sign of improvement at all.
Lixingnan’s words were another blow to Beijiao. In his daze, he couldn’t help but compare the two situations…
He didn’t know what the situation was between the seemingly optimistic Aju and Lin Shuang back then.
Some people don’t wear their intense emotions on their faces.
…What if Jiang Ran was the same?
If he really had an irreversible accident, what would she do?
Would she also think of the same “what if”?
Beijiao shuddered, not daring to think further.
…
A few days later, the hospital’s medical resources began to strain. Beijiao had mostly recovered and was discharged a bit earlier than expected.
During these days, Jiang Ran hadn’t come to the hospital again. So before discharge, with anxiety, when Lixingnan drove near the villa area, seeing the familiar buildings, he even felt a sense of fear.
Therefore, getting out of the car, he leaned on his recent illness to act weak, following behind Lixingnan, watching him enter the password and open the door he had passed through countless times before.
Familiar scents rushed to greet him at the entrance hall, causing his heart to involuntarily stop for a beat. Leaning against the threshold, he even hesitated for a moment whether to go in—
Even though just a few days ago, every second was filled with the desire to go home.
Lixingnan stood at the entrance taking off his shoes. After changing into slippers and hearing no movement behind for a while, he turned around and looked at him: “What are you doing at the door? Isn’t it cold?”
Beijiao obediently entered the house.
The door shut with a “bang,” shaking down a piece of snow from the eaves. At the same time, he heard a woman’s voice from inside.
“Back already?”
Her voice was gentle, with a slight hoarseness, giving an illusion of tenderness and laziness.
Beijiao changed into slippers and entered the living room. The curtains were open, and winter sunlight poured through the floor-to-ceiling windows, filling the room. A rich aroma of coffee floated in the air, saturating the entire living room…
The woman in white loungewear was leaning by the bed, holding a steaming cup of coffee, her soft black hair cascading over her shoulders, giving them only her back.
Hearing footsteps, she slowly turned her head. Her gaze swept over Lixingnan’s face, then past the man’s shoulder, looking at the boy standing behind her.
Her deep brown eyes flickered. Just as he thought she was about to say something, she gave a slight smile: “Looks like you’ve recovered quite well.”
She hadn’t appeared for several days, and now she greeted him so gently, as if nothing had happened and she had always been caring for him.
He hadn’t seen her again during these days. If it were before, he might have asked if she had no heart, but now he dared to ask nothing—
At the sight of her smile.
He vaguely felt that if some things were brought up directly, he would be completely finished.
He held back again and again, his gaze fixed on the curve of her lips, his heart filled with an indescribable bitterness. He stepped forward until he stood before her, raised the hand that could still move, and gently grasped her elbow.
She remained seated, looking up at him.
At such a close distance this time, he clearly saw that the smile in her eyes was merely a faint shimmer, while deep within her gaze, there seemed to be only a calm indifference.
He couldn’t help but brush his fingertip against the corner of her eye, his slender fingers tracing the contours of her face downward before coming to rest beneath her chin. After a brief pause, he lowered his head.
When his lips were extremely close to her pale ones, she subtly turned her head away.
So his kiss barely landed just a few millimeters away from her lips.
Between breaths, I could catch the warmth of her exhale.
“Go shave.” Her voice didn’t even sound resistant or carry any particular emotion. “It’s so prickly.”
And he was already in a daze.
His hand brushed against her cheek, then with a firmer touch, he cradled the back of her head and pulled her into his embrace—
These days, fragments of extreme negative emotions have been surging in endlessly, and at this very moment, they once again clamor and crowd within my chest, reaching their peak…
In that very moment, she was genuinely and warmly embraced in his arms, the two of them standing so close that the sunlight outside the window spilled over their shoulders.
Yet, Bei Jiao couldn’t feel a trace of warmth.
“I miss you.”
His voice was dry and bitter.
Yet there was no response. Instead, she raised her hand, her soft fingertips lightly brushing past his earlobe—seemingly tender—only to land on his chest the next moment, gently pushing him away.
“Go clean up, it’s almost time to eat.”
Her voice didn’t reveal the slightest flaw.
……
Beijiao went upstairs to shave and came back down looking neat and tidy.
Before even reaching the stairs, one could already hear Jiang Ran and Qiu Nian arguing—
It wasn’t really an argument, just a slightly louder discussion.
“What are you doing again? Didn’t you say you wouldn’t break up with him!”
Qiu Nian asked in confusion, but the response was a brief silence.
“The situation has changed.”
The woman’s voice was calm, no longer carrying that false cheerfulness. “Actually, it was you who reminded me of this matter,” she said.
“What did I remind you of? To break up with him?!”
“Right.”
“Jiang Ran, have a heart and spare me your nonsense. When did I ever make such a despicably witty remark? I certainly don’t recall it.”
“What’s all the excitement about?”
“How can I not be upset? You’re shifting the blame onto me. Haven’t you heard the saying, ‘Better to destroy a temple than break up a marriage’? I genuinely don’t understand—how could things change so suddenly? I just don’t get it. Do you realize you’re abandoning a pet? That’s something that deserves a lightning strike!”
“……”
“Have you made up your mind? When are you planning to tell him?”
The noise in the kitchen quieted down, and Bei Jiao didn’t listen anymore.
He turned back into the room, closed the door, then forcefully opened it again. The sound of footsteps descending the stairs grew louder as he arrived at the kitchen doorway. The two women standing beside the bubbling pot stopped their discussion upon hearing the door open and simultaneously turned their gaze toward him.
“What’s wrong? Why are you looking at me like that?”
Leaning against the wall, the handsome young man with pitch-black, unfathomable eyes smiled and asked, “Need any help?”
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