Fang Rulian followed the sound and looked up. Her mother was walking quickly toward her, holding a phone. The screen was still lit, and the elderly woman’s drawn-out wailing echoed from it like a death knell.
Fang Hong hung up the phone, tossed it onto the vanity, and grabbed Fang Rulian’s shoulders.
“Xiaolian!” Mu Yunshu, having heard the noise, rushed over as well. Together, they supported Fang Rulian from both sides and helped her into the living room, settling her onto the sofa.
“Are you okay?” Mu Yunshu lifted the hem of her nightgown slightly. A faint purple bruise was forming on her knee, but it wasn’t a major injury.
Fang Rulian shook her head. She was fine; her legs had just gone numb from sitting on the toilet too long.
She looked at Fang Hong, and a sudden thought flashed through her mind. She paused, forcing back her original explanation.
Her mother had clearly been on the phone with her grandmother just now. At this late hour, that woman—who had never shown her mother any favoritism—was once again demanding emotional labor from her.
“How did you fall so suddenly?” Fang Hong pulled at the girl’s arms, checking for other injuries. “Did your legs go numb from sitting too long?”
“Uh,”—it takes a mother to know her daughter—Fang Rulian hesitated and lowered her head. “A little bit too long.”
“Tsk, Fang Rulian, you—”
“It’s because I had diarrhea.” She shrank toward Mu Yunshu, keeping her head down. “I don’t know what happened, my stomach just started hurting really badly…”
Her face was somewhat pale. Mu Yunshu reached out to touch her forehead; she was indeed break out in a cold sweat.
“It doesn’t hurt now, Auntie Mu.” She looked up, stealing a glance at Fang Hong, and stammered, “As soon as Mom rushed in and… and hung up the phone, it stopped.”
Fang Hong and Mu Yunshu froze, looking down at the girl.
“Mom, do you think I’ve been a bit… abnormal these past two days?” Fang Rulian bit her lip, appearing troubled. “I’ve lived here for over a decade, and I’m an adult capable of taking care of myself. Why would I suddenly just fall off the balcony?”
Mu Yunshu looked confused. “Wasn’t it because your contact lens fell and you went to pick it up?”
Fang Rulian looked up at Fang Hong.
Others might not know the situation, but her mother surely did. Back then, when she had scrambled up from the floor in a mess and crashed into her mother’s arms like a lead weight—plus her behavior after waking up in the hospital—she didn’t believe Fang Hong was without suspicion.
If she weren’t suspicious, she wouldn’t have tried the “standing chopsticks” ritual.
Fang Hong nodded, signaling her to continue.
“I was in a daze back then. Anyway, I heard Mom calling me, and then… I fell.” She took a deep breath. “Later I had a nightmare, and last night I didn’t dare sleep alone, so I made Mom sleep with me.”
“Before, near the school, I was stopped by a fortune teller. He said… he said my uncle’s family and my ‘destiny’ clash. He told me not to associate with them, or bad things would happen…”
“When I was coming back, I rode my bike past my uncle’s house, and I started feeling unwell then. I didn’t dare tell you because they’re family.” The girl blinked. “But after Uncle and the others left today, my heart suddenly felt very panicked.”
She lied without blinking an eye. “Otherwise, why would I suddenly say those things to you, Mom? You haven’t fought with Grandma or Grandpa, and Uncle and Aunt haven’t been mean for just one day. Why didn’t I say it before, but chose today of all days?”
“What kind of fortune teller was this? He didn’t even have your birth chart; how could he calculate a clash of destinies?” Fang Hong frowned, half-skeptical.
“That’s why it was so amazing! And he was really good. I didn’t say a word; I just pointed at a few numbers on some papers, and he guessed my surname was Fang. Just now too—ten minutes ago, my stomach suddenly hurt.” She looked at Fang Hong. “Mom, you were on the phone with Grandma just then, weren’t you?”
Fang Hong went silent.
“Why is your hand bleeding?” Fang Hong’s gaze froze. She rushed to the cabinet to find a band-aid and pressed it onto Fang Rulian’s finger. “Your nail bed is bleeding.”
Fang Rulian didn’t say anything.
Fang Hong looked up at her, guilt swirling in her eyes as tears slowly welled up. “Does it hurt?”
“I don’t feel anything.”
Fang Rulian truly didn’t feel it.
“It’s bleeding, how can you not feel it? I’m sorry, Mom didn’t see it just now…” She took several deep breaths, tilting her head and murmuring to herself. “How did I not see it… I clearly checked just now…”
The woman’s voice trembled, and the hand holding Fang Rulian couldn’t stop shaking.
“It wasn’t bleeding just then, so we didn’t notice…” Mu Yunshu placed her hand on the back of Fang Hong’s, patting it gently. “The fortune teller might not be right, and Xiaolian is very blessed.”
Just as she finished speaking, Fang Hong suddenly stood up.
She went into the kitchen and brought back a bowl of water and three chopsticks.
The chopsticks wouldn’t stand because Fang Hong’s hands were shaking too much. It pained Fang Rulian to watch. “Mom, I…”
“Yunshu, you do it.”
Mu Yunshu had never done this before. The first two attempts failed, but the third was finally successful. However, before Fang Hong could finish the incantations, the phone rang.
Fang Hong glanced at it and answered.
“Hello, Mom, I have an emergency, I’ll call you back—” Before she could finish, the three chopsticks standing in the bowl suddenly toppled over, clattering against the edge of the table and falling to the floor.
Fang Hong was stunned.
“It’s fine, maybe there was a breeze. Let’s try again.” Mu Yunshu leaned down to pick up the chopsticks. In her peripheral vision, she saw the girl’s leg, which had been pressed against the table corner, pull back.
Following that gaze, she saw the girl looking at Fang Hong on the other side. Her eyes were bright, her expression one of innocent confusion.
The phone call ended, and they performed the fourth attempt. It was successful from start to finish.
…
After sending the child back to her room, Mu Yunshu patted Fang Hong’s shoulder. “Since the child is already feeling unwell, it’s better to have less contact with that side for a while.”
Having lived together for over a decade, Mu Yunshu naturally knew what Fang Hong endured from her natal family. She felt for Fang Hong and had advised her several times, but ultimately, she wasn’t the one living it—who can make a decision for someone else?
Fang Hong looked up. “Yunshu, you’re an intellectual. Tell me, is this just feudal superstition?”
“Objectively speaking, it is. But who would gamble with their own child? What if? It’s better to avoid it.” She lowered her eyes. “Especially since Xiaolian has already been hurt.”
Fang Hong let out a long breath.
After a long while, she slowly looked up and smiled at Mu Yunshu. “I understand.”
The lights went out again, and the house fell into darkness.
In her bedroom, Fang Rulian lay sprawled on her back. She strained her ears until there was no more sound from the living room, then let out a slow sigh of relief—this had likely worked.
She pressed her palm against her chest for a while. Her eyes shifted toward the framed photo on the nightstand.
The toddler in the photo who couldn’t yet walk had grown into a tall adult, but Fang Hong, holding the child, hadn’t changed much—she had worked too hard in her youth, and her face bore an unshakeable exhaustion, but her features were beautiful. With some dressing up, she would surely be a great beauty.
When Fang Rulian was young, she had faced various probes from relatives. Most common were rumors that Fang Hong was going to get married, would abandon her, and would become someone else’s mother.
Fang Rulian was proud and had strong self-esteem. She would laugh it off to their faces, but once home, she would cling to Fang Hong and cry, asking if she was being abandoned.
As she grew up, she stopped asking, because Fang Hong truly had no intention of remarrying. Later, when Fang Rulian became more sensible, she would even ask circuitously if Fang Hong wanted to find a partner.
Fang Hong, who was munching on an apple, had stopped mid-bite, frowning in confusion. After thinking seriously for a moment, she pulled out her phone, opened an idol drama, and pointed at the male lead. “I want this one.”
That was a bit difficult. Fang Rulian had said, “I can’t pull that off.”
Fang Hong sneered and continued eating her apple. “Then what the hell are you asking for?”
…
Outside the window, the traffic was noisy.
Fang Rulian withdrew her gaze from the photo and got up to close the window.
It was late, and there were almost no pedestrians, only cars weaving back and forth. The dim yellow streetlights spilled down onto the heavy foliage, looking like a tree half-filled with golden-orange osmanthus flowers.
Fang Rulian yawned and climbed into bed.
The moment the lights went out and darkness took over, she suddenly wondered: What is Fang Zhiyi doing right now?
A faint white light glowed in the dark space. The phone screen showed: 11:45 PM.
The senior high boarders finished their evening self-study at 10:30, and the dormitory lights were turned off collectively at 11:30. But Fang Zhiyi usually didn’t sleep that early; she should be studying by a small lamp right now.
Closing her eyes gently, it felt as if that person were sitting right in front of her. The dim yellow halo warmly enveloped the desk, outlining the girl’s quiet, smooth profile.
Her breathing was almost inaudible.
In a secret corner known to no one, Fang Rulian quietly let herself go, thinking of her.
The curtains were drawn tight, shutting out the streetlights and moonlight. Only a few stubborn slivers of moonlight lingered anxiously on the windowsill, leaving cold, frost-like traces.
Under the same night sky, the moonlight was sparse like remnant snow, falling onto the old floor of the student dormitory.
It was late, and the dorm was quiet, save for the occasional sound of pages turning.
Fang Zhiyi quietly put away the small desk on her bed and tucked her test papers into her backpack.
She wasn’t sleepy.
Leaning against the stacked quilts behind her, she reached out to a small shelf and picked up a black-covered book. The book was very new—a gift a friend had just given her. She had only unwrapped it that afternoon.
Her gaze slowly swept over the characters on the cover:
The Seventh Day, by Yu Hua.