Chapter 13 Chapter Thirteen

Jiaqi thought and thought, and finally decided to send Ruan Zhengdong a text message. "Recover well." The four characters were spelled in pinyin, bit by bit, and spelled very slowly. She was not sure if the last sick word had a nasal sound, and southerners would be so embarrassing.When she was hesitating, the phone screen suddenly flickered, and the number was very strange. She thought it was a customer, but it turned out to be Meng Heping. He asked, "Do you have time?" Then he paused, "Can you come out and meet?" Jiaqi felt that her knees were weak, because she didn't sleep well, her whole body was limp, as if she had a fever, but she still agreed.

She got off work late, and she seemed to never finish the odd things in her hands. Before leaving, Zhou Jingan asked, "Why are you dawdling and still not off work?" She was a little dazed by what she said, maybe she subconsciously He wanted to escape, but it was a moment too late—in fact, there was nothing to be afraid of, he and she should have been passers-by a long time ago. When she walked out of the building and saw Meng Heping's car, she calmed down. He came to her, maybe there was nothing else. Meng Heping drove her to a newly opened Chaozhou restaurant. The snails cooked in the open oven were very refreshing, the green plum sauce tasted authentic, and the mandarin duck crab was even more delicious.Too many dishes, a big table, only the two of them.He wasn't like this in the past, he could eat a dish of green vegetables when she stir-fried vegetables with relish - after so many years, many things must have changed.

Jiaqi has no appetite, and just doesn’t know how to taste a table of exquisite dishes. Elephant bone chopsticks are carved with exquisite patterns, and the chopsticks are tied with thin silver chains, just like old-fashioned chopsticks, with a homely luxury and softness.The silver chain swayed in the palm of his hand with a rustling sound, like a bit of rain in autumn, which was refreshing and cold. "Jia Qi," he seemed to be thinking, and finally put away the napkin, but only asked, "Why don't you eat vegetables?" It took her a lot of effort to keep the smile on her face: "I'm losing weight." She simply put down her chopsticks, "If you have anything to say, just say it."

On the contrary, he was a little dazed, and after a while he said: "I am engaged to Ruan Jiangxi." Word by word slipped into her ears, Jiaqi struggled to put these words together into sentences, there seemed to be a brief blank in her mind, she thought over and over twice before she understood. She smiled slowly, said "Congratulations", and took a spoonful of the green and green national protection dish. It was only when she ate it that she realized that the soup, which seemed to have no trace of heat, was so hot that it burned people's throats and hair Tight, almost even tears come out.

Fortunately, there was ice water in the cup at hand, and she drank it silently, it was very cold, and the icy cold entered her stomach, and she already felt a dull pain in her stomach. "Dongzi's situation is very bad," he said slowly, "so Jiangxi hopes to get married as soon as possible." The phone in her handbag was ringing, she said "I'm sorry", and took out the phone from her handbag, the screen flickered: "Is Ruan Zhengdong answering the call?" She looked at the line of words in a daze: "Did you answer Ruan Zhengdong's call?"

Finally she picked it up, said sorry to Meng Heping, then got up and left the dining table to listen in the corridor. There was no one in the corridor, and Ruan Zhengdong was a little hesitant on the phone at first, and called "Jiaqi", but she was the same as before, and asked him casually: "Oh, it's you, did you see the pretty little nurse today?" Sirah just talked about other things.So Ruan Zhengdong also seemed to relax, and talked about other things according to the situation. He has always been doing nothing like this, and never said a serious word.After a long time, Jiaji hummed to show that she was listening.She kept walking back and forth, one trip at a time, with doors of countless private rooms on both sides, a little halo from behind the frosted glass, and faint laughter and singing.In a very lively restaurant, occasionally a waiter passed by her with a plate. A man in uniform with a handsome face leaned sideways to avoid her. The urge to feast on it right away.Just listening to Ruan Zhengdong talking nonsense on the phone—the corridor is covered with silver-gray wallpaper, and there are small flowers printed on the wallpaper. When the light shines, every silver petal seems to protrude. When I groped with my fingers, I realized that it was actually flat.She groped for those flowers, small petals, silver flowers on a silver-gray background, and it took her a long time to recognize them as roses, one by one, crowded together, blooming on the wall.She was suspicious again for a while, but she felt that she had never answered Ruan Zhengdong's call in the middle of the night, nor had he said that sentence, and nothing had happened—but she finally interrupted him and asked, "What do you want to eat tonight?" ?”

Ruan Zhengdong was taken aback. She went on to say: "I'll go to the hospital later, I'll bring you some supper, what do you want to eat?" He didn't answer, just asked: "Are you at home?" She said, "Yeah, I'm at home, how about I make you some wontons." He was silent for a long time before he said, "I want to eat stuffed shepherd's purse." Jiaqi finally laughed and said, "This season, where can I turn shepherd's purse into wontons for you?" He immediately replied in a good temper: "The stuffed cabbage is also fine."

Jiaqi said: "You are stupid, there are no wontons stuffed with cabbage, only dumplings stuffed with cabbage." He hesitated for a moment: "Jia Qi?" "Ok?" "Are you crying?" She said: "No." Only then did she realize that the cold tears had already fallen on the back of her hand, one by one was crystal clear. It turned out that she was really crying. She raised her hand to wipe it away, but the tears came out faster. She didn't know why, but she just felt very sad, and couldn't help the tears anyway, and simply squatted down, just silently.

He asked: "What's wrong with you?" "I'm fine." Jiaqi took a breath, "I'll be there later." He hurriedly turned off the phone, went to the bathroom to touch up his makeup, and then went back to the private room. Meng Heping was smoking.The light in the private room was dim, and the pale smoke surrounded him, making it impossible to see his face clearly. She approached slowly, as if she was afraid of disturbing something. The cigarette case was placed on the dining table casually by him. The cloudy, purple packaging reminded her of the camellia flower on the cigarette case back then.

For a long time, every time she saw others smoking that kind of cigarette, she couldn't help but look around.But later this kind of smoke gradually decreased, and finally stopped production and withdrew from the market. There are many, many things in this world that will eventually be lost in time, forgotten and no longer remembered. He said "I'm sorry" to her and was about to put out the cigarette in his hand. She smiled and said, "It's okay." So polite, courteous and respectful as a guest, but after several years of hard work, there is no way to go back to the past.

In the end he drove her back, Jiaqi saw the brightly lit supermarket by the roadside from a distance, and said, "Just let me go here, I have to buy some food." He said, "So late?" She nodded without explaining. She bought celery, meat stuffing, and dough wrappers, washed her hands after beating and went home, and started mixing stuffing to make wontons. Spread out the dough, put the stuffing on it, then fold in half, and fold the two corners alternately in half.Wontons in the shape of ingots were neatly arranged on the plate, and there were twenty of them by count, so they were no longer wrapped.I got up and boiled water, but there was no chicken soup, so I had to use chicken essence to season, put seaweed, and finally put a little green coriander on the wontons, put them in a thermos bucket, and put on my coat again to go out. It was past ten o'clock when I arrived at the hospital, and the corridor was quiet. She stood in front of the ward and knocked on the door. She always felt a little silly, and she was still carrying a thermos. There was no sound behind the door, she knocked on the door again, but there was still no response. So she went back to the nurse's station to ask, and the nurse on duty told her in a low voice, "It seems to be out." Jiaqi looked at his watch, it was already ten forty-five, where did he go so late?It's not that it's not funny, he's still a patient. She took out the phone, and found Ruan Zhengdong's name in the phone book, hesitated for a while, and finally did not press the dial button.So I sat on the chair in the corridor and waited, hugging the thermos, like hugging a cat, warm.There were no other patients on this floor, so it was surprisingly quiet. A faint human voice could be heard from the nurse's station, and after a while, it was quiet again. There is also a heating pipe in the hallway, right next to the bench, so warm that it makes people feel tired, and she almost falls asleep.But just as soon as his consciousness became confused, his head drooped unknowingly, and his chin hit the lid of the insulated bucket in his arms heavily. With a "bang", she exhaled in pain.There seemed to be a door closing not far away, and she was still a little confused. She wondered if the nurse on duty had changed, so she put the thermos on the bench, rubbed her chin with one hand, and looked at her watch with the other. , it's already twelve o'clock. When Jiaqi came out of the hospital, the midnight air was so cold that she shivered uncontrollably.Fortunately, there were still taxis waiting at the door. After getting on the bus, I realized that I forgot the thermos bucket on the bench, and hurriedly said to the driver, "Master, I'm really sorry, I forgot something." Fortunately, the driver was kind: "It's okay, you go get it." She ran back in a hurry, there was quite a distance from the gate to the hospital building.Walking at night feels even more distant. Fortunately, there is an elevator to go upstairs.After getting out of the elevator and turning a corner along the corridor, the benches were already empty and nothing was left. Her footsteps involuntarily slowed down, there was only one door far away on both sides of the corridor, almost every door was closed, the only one was ajar, and an orange light shone through the gap of the door, she walked lightly , hold your breath. Looking in through the gap of two or three inches wide, it is as narrow as a scene in a movie, Ruan Zhengdong is sunk deeply in the sofa, only his side face can be seen, he must have been sitting there for a long time, because his mouth contains The cigarette I was using had accumulated a long piece of ash, but it didn't fall off.She hardly dared to move, and could only look out following his gaze. On the coffee table was her thermos bucket, with a goose yellow body and two fluffy little ducks painted on it, under the orange light of the floor lamp , as warm as two small pompoms. I don't know how long it took before he straightened up. Jiaqi thought he would stand up, but he just stubbed out the cigarette butt, took another cigarette, struck a match and lit it. A small flame shone bluely on his face, and then he blew it out again. He stretched out his hand and touched the two ducklings painted on the outer shell of the thermos with his index finger. His movements were very light, as if they were two real ducklings, and his fingertips followed the outline of the little pompom carefully.After a while, I don't know what I thought of, and I smiled to myself. He had a good-looking smile, the corners of his eyes slanted deep into his temples, his lips were pursed and curved softly. Jiaqi leaned her head against the door and burst into tears. Who knew that Ruan Zhengdong would turn his head back: "Who is it?" She was startled, coughed involuntarily, her voice was still hoarse: "It's me." The door was completely pushed open, and her whole body was bathed in thin orange light. He didn't turn around, and was still facing her sideways.After a while he asked, "Why are you back again?" She approached slowly and said, "I didn't wait for you." He was silent. She did not speak again. In the end, he said: "Why do you need to come back? In many cases, you will never be able to wait." Jiaqi is stubborn but soft: "But you are always here." He finally smiled, but turned his face away: "Maybe one day I won't be here." Jiaqi felt terrified, her heart was empty, so empty that she had to talk, she coughed again, and said, "Let's eat wontons." She lowered her head and opened the lid of the insulated bucket. Mud soup.The skin of the dough fell apart, the stuffing was completely immersed in the soup, there was a layer of oil on the soup surface, even the finely chopped coriander had turned black, the surface of the soup vibrated slightly, and there were small ripples, so it turned out that I shed tears again.She coughed to cover it up, and turned around holding the thermos: "I can't eat it, I'll make it for you tomorrow, and I'll come back tomorrow." All the way to the door, she didn't look back. He suddenly caught up with her a few steps and hugged her from behind, so caught off guard, so forcefully, the thermos bucket flew out of her hand, and Gu Lulu rolled far away, splashing the soup all over the floor. He turned her face over and kissed her fiercely, as if he had exhausted all his strength, kissed her, and held her tightly, as if he wanted to rub her into his body if he could. Tears are salty, kisses are bitter, blood is astringent, all the tastes are entangled in the tongue and teeth, she can hardly breathe, the air in her lungs has been squeezed out, and he is so urgent, it seems that it is too late, but it is too late .Everything in this world is too late for him. He finally let go of his hand, but his eyes were still close at hand, so black and deep, reflecting her own eyes, there was a lot of water mist inside, as if condensation."Please forgive me," he said. He said: "Please forgive me for being so selfish, I don't want to let you go again." It was the first time in her life that she saw a man's tears, a big one, falling down with a sizzle.He turned his face away in embarrassment, and she turned his face away slowly and stubbornly, standing on tiptoe hesitantly and hesitantly. Wet tears dried under his soft lips, he lowered his head slowly, his lips were very hot, Jiaqi felt like a soldering iron, and he was ice, every bit of heat would melt him, as if there was something Drops of water fall in the dark night, tentatively and hesitantly.He embraced her again, deeply and forcefully, the two of them just entangled their lips and tongue, this kiss was so deep and long, with the sweet smell of tobacco, the smell of medicine on his body, and the soft fragrance of her body, inch by inch The two lit up.It's as if the fireworks are in full bloom, knowing that they will be turned into ashes, but they try their best to burn as brightly as possible, and bloom the most beautiful and dazzling fire. She finally pushed him away, his eyes were still dazed, his chest was heaving violently, and he seemed to want to hug her again. She put her hand against him and whispered, "The nurse is here." The nurse had already arrived, holding a sphygmomanometer and a medicine cup, her young face was full of embarrassment: "I'll come back later." She turned around and almost ran away. Jiaqi was also very embarrassed, quickly closed the door, and after a moment of silence, he finally laughed, first silently, then out loud, and finally out loud. She was annoyed and embarrassed: "You're still laughing!" He just smiled: "Hey, bring me the wontons, I'm hungry." Jiaqi said: "It's all spilled, it's all your fault." He admitted in a very good temper: "It's all my fault." Unexpectedly, he pecked her lips lightly again, couldn't help it, and kissed her again.Jiaqi pushed him away and said, "Why are you talking endlessly?" He murmured, "I'm so hungry, why don't we go out to eat?" Jiaqi ignored him: "It's already midnight, you should go to bed, you are still a patient, I have to go back too." "I won't be able to sleep if I'm hungry, let's go out for a midnight snack." He acted unreasonably like a child who wanted the candy. Finally the two slipped out, tiptoeing past the nurse's station, almost in slow motion, like thieves. The taxi driver was still waiting for her, parked the car by the side of the driveway, and took a nap in the car. Jiaqi felt very touched, but the elder brother laughed: "It's okay, it's midnight anyway, there's nothing else Business." Glancing at Ruan Zhengdong in the rearview mirror, he said, "Hey, I forgot such an important thing, no wonder it took me so long to go back and look for it." Jiaqi chuckled, thinking that the taxi drivers in this city are all well-deserved eloquence. Going to eat Malatang and barbecue, there are only a few people in the small shop in the second half of the night, Ruan Zhengdong has never been to this kind of place, he just looks at the greasy table.A round hole was dug in the middle of the table, and strings and strings of suspicious-looking things were cooked in the embedded pots. At first glance, there were kelp and bean curds, and some looked like meat skewers.There were three or four students who looked like students sitting around a table, drinking beer in cold weather, punching and yelling, enjoying their own happiness.At the other table was a couple, very young, neither in their twenties.The woman may be a bartender in some bar. She just got off work and still has heavy makeup on her face. She has blue eyeshadow all over her eye circles, but she smiles like a child. She is eating mutton skewers with her boyfriend, and her boyfriend is considerate. He stirred the hot eight-treasure porridge for her, and put it in front of her.The two of them were mumbling and talking, and from time to time they leaned forward and back with laughter. When the charcoal fire rack was brought up, it sizzled, and there was a smell of smoke and fire. The oil of the mutton skewers dripped on the charcoal fire, emitting choking smoke. Jiaqi ordered stinky tofu again. Ruan Zhengdong was suspicious: "This kind of place eats this kind of food." Will things cause diarrhea?" Jiaqi tried her best to comfort him: "I've eaten it many times, it must be fine, you try it, it's guaranteed to be better than shark's fin." After the stinky tofu was baked, Ruan Zhengdong frowned slightly, with an expression of respect and distance.Jiaqi didn't force him, but just ate it to his heart's content.Seeing her eating with gusto, he finally couldn't help it: "You don't want to kiss me again after you finish eating this." Because it was hot, she inhaled straight, and took a big sip of the juice before rolling her eyes at him: "Who wants to kiss you?" He approached her and smiled badly: "I want to kiss you."