Nan Zhi originally didn’t want him to start working this early, he was still in recovery period, but if it really was as he said, being too idle would make him anxious, then better to do a bit.
This thing called anxiety, she had experienced personally—wild thoughts, sleepless through the whole night and night again, forcing herself to endure, lying down till her back and waist ached yet still unable to sleep, mind incomparably clear thinking about the past, the mistakes she made, the regrets she had, worrying about the future and later, sorrows from over-loaning.
But really, getting up to do something would feel a lot better. The key point was being unable to get up. The fact that he could still move meant psychologically there wasn’t a big problem. That’s quite good.
And also, he was speaking with such a soft soft tone.
Nan Zhi: If he wants stars in the sky, she’ll buy them for him!
No wonder when girls act spoiled, boys would compromise. So it turns out girls also can’t handle boys doing this act.
This simply cannot be endured.
Buy!
Nan Zhi looked at the IV drip. There was still about more than an hour. Song Qing also saw that and wanted to let her rest a bit first, then call her again when the drip needed changing, but Nan Zhi said she was still fine.
She was still quite energetic now.
Really very strange, normally at this time she would already be a mush collapsed on the bed, the kind of person who even felt tired just eating a meal, but today sitting on the sofa, she actually didn’t feel her eyelids heavy for a long time, still had strength.
Could it be that raising a little wife is really beneficial to mental illness recovery?
Nan Zhi had never gone to see, but she felt her own psyche had problems—guilt toward grandma, family affection that was gained only because of money, not doing well on exams, tense doctor-patient relationships every day, such a small place with a few people and several WeChat groups.
Anyway, every day she felt so tired, every night her mind was playing a drama series on repeat, while angrily thinking: who even cares about your groups, add or don’t add, whatever.
While working she reminded herself to be colder, not to think about being good to those patients, not to think about building good relationships with them—it was simply impossible.
As for family affection, she couldn’t manage it, could only cold-handle it, frequently entangling herself in other things to ignore this.
As for grandma, grandma would only hope she was well, hope she could grow up healthily.
Sometimes she even suspected Song Qing was grandma reincarnated. If not for the time not matching, the gender not matching, she’d have to call out “Grandma” at least once.
Or maybe grandma saw she was suffering, so specially investigated a bit, found that Song Qing was a good child, and so let her meet Song Qing.
That day was really strange—hearing the other interns talk, the cat seller stopped replying at a key point, and on top of that was the young man who jumped off the building—many reasons stacked together, she ended up choosing not to buy the cat, paid his medical fee, and even brought the person home.
It was like someone was pulling the strings in the dark. If there really was someone, it must be grandma.
Anyway, no matter what, if she could be pulled into diligence, she’d feel she profited.
People with healthy psychology might not understand that kind of depressed feeling—every day feeling like a rat in a sewer, struggling to survive, the stench coming off the body getting heavier and heavier, the person continuously rotting.
Before, when basked in sunshine, she liked the darkness a lot. Later, she longed intensely for sunshine, hoped to be able to stand under the sun.
Her house had sunshine, and a lot of it too. But very unfortunately, work at 8 a.m., waking up at 7:30. When she got up the sun hadn’t climbed into her house yet. When she got home at night, past five, the sun had mostly faded, only the desolate setting sun could be seen.
Even during summer when the sunlight was still pretty good, once winter came, the sun rose early and set early too—every time she came back, it was pitch black and cold as ice.
“Song Qing,” Nan Zhi poked him too, “how’s the sunlight in my room during the day?”
She suddenly got a bit curious—what he saw, what kind of state her room looked like to him.
Song Qing was slightly stunned, after a moment he nodded, “Very good.”
Should say extremely good. The first time, he saw sunlight passing through the balcony and into the living room, directly shining onto the entrance door—the whole house was pierced by light, like it was shrouded in golden glow.
She had two walls that were all glass, a standard square shape, with a recessed hanging ceiling inside, and no open atrium in the middle, so the sunlight shot straight down from a high place, all the way to the entryway.
The whole place was bathed in sunlight, even the air smelled of sunlight. It was the best house he’d ever seen.
He had gone to tutor someone else before—that family was already considered quite rich, living in a four-bedroom one-living-room home. The sunlight there was also good. Every morning when he sat with that family’s kid in the sunlit living room, he would stretch out his hand and carefully feel the warm light filtering through his fingers.
But after coming here, he realized that Nan Zhi’s home was even more beautiful than theirs, and the sunlight even more abundant.
Of course, it was worlds beyond that shabby little storage room in his uncle and aunt’s house—damp, cold, with only one small window front and back. The front window couldn’t be opened; only the back faced west, and in the evening, there’d be a sliver of sunset that shone in.
Even so, he had already felt satisfied. He often imagined, if that room were his alone, with no clutter inside, how would he arrange his things? Where would the bed be, the desk, where would he read, and so on.
This place—probably a place he didn’t even dare to imagine, could only get a fleeting glimpse of in a dream.
Nan Zhi nodded, “That’s good then.”
She tilted her head to look at him, smiling with a hint of dimples at the corners of her lips. “Being under the sunlight will be good for your recovery.”
At least he wouldn’t be staring at an empty, cold cold house, feeling more and more helpless.
Song Qing froze.
Nan Zhi continued, “Help me take a few videos tomorrow, I also want to see what the house looks like during the day.”
She had days off—on off days she could technically see it too, but she was lazy. On days off, she could sleep from morning straight into the afternoon around two or three. By the time she woke up, even daylilies had turned cold [黄花菜都凉了 — a Chinese idiom meaning: it’s already too late], so she hadn’t actually seen her house much in daylight.
“Okay.” Song Qing agreed right away.
Nan Zhi was very satisfied, got up to prepare to head out, first counting how many packages she had, then checking what food was missing in the fridge.
In fact, everything was missing in the fridge, but there were only two or three packages.
The hallway in her place was long, and the floor was high. It was kind of like a residential compound—you had to walk a bit before reaching the main entrance, and then head toward the supermarket, which was annoyingly placed not too near yet not far either.
If you drove, parking was a hassle. If you walked, it felt far. So every time she bought a lot of stuff, she had to prepare a small cart. Same for picking up packages.
During her first week living here, Nan Zhi had already discovered this and bought one early on. It was in the stairwell storage. She pulled it out, just unfolded the folded part, and suddenly remembered: under Song Qing’s wheelchair there was a little fabric pouch.
Square-shaped and quite spacious. The handles at the back could even hang stuff. It wasn’t worse in capacity than her trolley. If she brought him, she wouldn’t need to bring the cart.
Nan Zhi immediately pushed it back and placed the plastic bags she had prepared for shopping into the pouch under his wheelchair.
Every time she ordered delivery, groceries online, etc., they’d give these. The quality looked pretty good too. She was reluctant to throw them away, but using them as trash bags was too big—so she could only use them while out shopping. Since she already brought a basket anyway, having this extra one didn’t hurt.
Behind her, Song Qing silently watched her get ready. After thinking for a bit, he turned the roller that controlled the IV drip to the maximum. By the time she had finished putting on her coat and came back down, the liquid in the bottle was almost done dripping. He then quietly adjusted the roller back to the speed she had set before.
She didn’t notice the change, came over to take a look, felt it was about done, then pulled the needle out, medical tape stuck on, and let him press on it.
He obediently pressed it properly, sat in the wheelchair, waiting to go out with her. But she stood off to the side, finished tidying up the medical waste, yet didn’t move for a long while.
—
Nan Zhi was looking at the difference between herself and him. Right now, this kind of weather—sometimes cold, sometimes hot—was like a child’s face, constantly changing. Lately it had gotten colder again, with highs only in the teens [Celsius], and at night the wind was strong—you’d need to wear a windbreaker plus a jacket kind of situation.
He was still wearing thin clothes. When she hung clothes for him earlier, Nan Zhi had seen that he basically didn’t have any clothes for this season. If she had to say, it would probably be his school uniform.
The school uniform was too recognizable, so he usually didn’t wear it. Not wearing it meant he had no clothes.
No wonder it always felt strange—she was wearing a sweatshirt and a windbreaker, while he was floating around in a single shirt. She wasn’t sure if the T-shirt inside had been washed; she hadn’t paid attention, but anyway, he wasn’t wearing it today.
Nan Zhi ran upstairs again to look through her own wardrobe.
She had quite a lot of clothes herself. She also liked to dress casual, and many of them were unisex styles. He should be able to wear them.
She quickly found a fleece-lined sweatshirt. She felt it was a bit big on her, but because it was wine red and she liked the color, she had kept it. She even waited more than ten days back then for delivery.
Nan Zhi brought it down, afraid he wouldn’t wear it, so she said it was originally a men’s item, and she only bought it because she liked the color.
This piece of clothing was very simple, and now men’s clothing really did have more variety—sometimes even flashier than women’s—so he didn’t suspect anything. Just as he was hesitating, she directly stretched out the hem and collar to put it over his head.
This person had just gotten an injection and was still pressing on the injection site. He wanted to stop her but didn’t make it in time, and was immediately reminded, “Press properly, don’t move.”
While speaking she pulled it down over his head. When it got to the shoulders, she found it was too small—it wouldn’t fit.
This person’s frame was that big? Turns out he was over 1.8 meters. She had asked before—not measured exactly, but he was taller than classmates who were 180 cm.
Nan Zhi was just a bit over 1.6 meters. The gap was too big.
She had no choice but to awkwardly take it off again, hugging it as she went back upstairs to change to another one.
The second floor’s interior-facing side was all glass. She didn’t pull the curtains during the day, so from the large living room to the right, Song Qing could basically see very clearly what was happening upstairs.
She opened the wardrobe, searching through clothing piece by piece. After picking them out, she laid them on the bed to compare them to the wine-red sweatshirt—seemingly measuring which one was bigger, which one was more suitable for him.
Some she hung back up, some she set aside. After a while, she came down hugging the pile she had set aside.
On the top of the clothes was even a thin fleece blanket, but she didn’t directly drape the blanket over him. Instead, she set it aside, dug through the clothes, and when she saw him looking over, she said fiercely: “Press properly.”
His hand, which wasn’t even moving before, used a bit more strength—pressed more firmly on the injection site.
Nan Zhi then did the same as before—stretched open the hem and collar. At first she still asked for his opinion, but now she directly stuffed it over his head. Once it passed the shoulders, she got happy, and in one go held onto his wrist and stuffed it into the sleeve. But after pulling it down, she realized—it was too short, only reached his waist.
Nan Zhi took it off him again, now completely disregarding what he thought, changed to another one and kept tossing clothes onto him.
Song Qing didn’t have a single objection either, because he knew Nan Zhi was doing it for his own good.
The weather outside was very cold. You could feel it just by opening the window. It was the same as when he was in the hospital—if you dressed out of sync with the season, you’d attract attention. He was already being noticed because of his legs. If his clothes were also off, the stares he drew would only increase.
Maybe it was because she didn’t want him to be stared at by more strange and pitying eyes, so she went through all the trouble, insisted on trying clothes that suited him.
He had noticed—the clothes she brought were chosen with him in mind. They were either dark colors or black, colors that wouldn’t make him be mocked as “girly” when worn.
Actually, he didn’t care anymore. Even if it were a pink one, it didn’t matter—because he knew this person wasn’t doing it with any intent of humiliation or wanting to make fun of him when she gave him the clothes.
She was completely different from the daughter of his uncle and aunt’s family. That girl knew that if she didn’t wear something, her parents would definitely give it to him. She waited just to watch him become a joke and therefore refused.
She even waited outside, and when he walked past and she saw him wearing the socks she didn’t want, she would laugh at him—“Only useless men wear women’s socks.”
Or she would bring classmates to peek through the window crack to watch him putting on socks and changing shoes, then say to her classmates that he was a pervert.
This person wouldn’t. She simply was afraid he’d be cold.
Song Qing looked at her busy figure and thought—
If this world has angels, then it must be someone like her.