Xi Shi huddled in the puffy down jacket, dazed and silent.
She could vaguely sense that Lin Youhe's driving habits had changed from before.
He no longer cruised through traffic at an unhurried pace. Instead, he silently watched the car ahead for turn signals, silently changing lanes and overtaking.
He hovered at the edge of speeding almost the entire way.
Xi Shi's breathing was rapid, cold sweat streaming down her body.
She tilted her head and watched Lin Youhe's tense profile for a while, then slowly let her blurred gaze fall on his equally tense knuckles gripping the steering wheel.
Xi Shi wanted to tell Lin Youhe that she'd experienced something similar before, but she could barely manage to speak.
Instead, Lin Youhe, at a red light, reached into the collar of the down jacket again and pressed his fingers against the artery on the side of her neck. Then he sighed and called her name helplessly: "Xi Shi."
Xi Shi's vision was like looking through frosted glass—even blinking had become a struggle.
She heard him ask, "Have you actually eaten anything properly these past two days?"
She probably had, right?
Probably…
She gasped out an "Mm."
Lin Youhe withdrew his hand from her neck and squeezed her cold, numb hand firmly. "We're almost there."
Beds at the Municipal People's Hospital were extremely tight, and most inpatient admissions couldn't be arranged until the next day.
Patients in critical condition had to spend the night in the emergency room, where they might witness other patients' suffering or death amid the resuscitation efforts.
Lin Youhe drove Xi Shi directly to the private hospital nearest to Jinyue Jingyuan No. 1.
The car slid neatly into a parking spot. Lin Youhe tossed out a "Wait here" and got out.
Xi Shi closed her eyes and waited until a wheelchair arrived.
Lin Youhe settled Xi Shi into the wheelchair and pushed her all the way into the emergency building.
Blood pressure, heart rate, respiration, pulse oximetry—after ruling out immediate danger, the doctor handed the results to Lin Youhe and told him to go pay first.
Xi Shi wasn't fully conscious at the moment. The physical discomfort consumed most of her attention, and the little that remained, along with her gaze, rested on Lin Youhe as he spoke with the doctor.
Her ears felt blocked with water—muffled, indistinct. She only felt Lin Youhe ruffle the top of her head, and then his hand came to rest gently on her shoulder, like a comfort.
When it was the doctor's turn to speak with Xi Shi, Lin Youhe held her icy hand at her side and patiently repeated the questions she hadn't been able to process in time.
Examinations, IV drip, admission procedures…
Finally, Lin Youhe pushed Xi Shi to the ward, peeled off the men's down jacket from her, and helped lift her onto the hospital bed.
After the IV had been running for over ten minutes, Xi Shi briefly regained some clarity. She noticed that Lin Youhe had also grabbed her oversized thermos on his way out—it looked like he intended to feed her some water.
Xi Shi watched Lin Youhe lower his head and sniff the end of the straw, then open the lid of the thermos.
And then he laughed—a laugh of exasperation.
Xi Shi knew nothing of what happened after that. Under the effects of the medication, her consciousness grew fainter and fainter until she finally fell asleep.
In the dimness, she sensed someone approaching. She frowned and tried to pull away, but her wrist was caught.
A familiar voice, with great patience, spoke softly by her ear: "It's just the nurse removing the needle. Don't be afraid."
Don't be afraid…
Those words pulled Xi Shi into even more chaotic fragments of memory—
In the dream, there was Shen Meiyan's face, aggressive to the point of near madness. She grabbed Xi Shi's hair and slammed the art drafts onto Xi Shi's desk, sneering.
Chen Lintian, Xi Shi's homeroom teacher, reeking of alcohol, hurled his lesson plan at her.
…
Grandma, Grandma, Grandma, wake up, Grandma!
Help! Is there anyone who can save my grandma!
Please.
Please don't leave me alone!
…
"Please prepare yourself."
"The patient has no vital signs."
"Please accept my condolences."
…
The alley after rain was thick with the scent of damp earth. The streetlight had been broken for half a month with no one fixing it. In the pitch-black darkness, Chen Lintian, drunk, picked his way forward using his phone's flashlight, a briefcase tucked under his arm.
Xi Shi gripped the sharp blade in her hand, her chest heaving.
Heavy clouds pressed down on the night sky. That night had no stars and no moon—perfect for sending Chen Lintian to meet the King of Hell.
Just as Xi Shi was about to charge out, a tall figure clamped a hand over her mouth and nose, shoving her violently into the corner of a deeper, narrower side alley.
He easily caught her wrist and subdued her resistance.
Xi Shi slammed her knee hard into him.
He took the hit as if he felt nothing before pressing her against the corner, and said with a teasing laugh: "With strength like that, you couldn't kill anyone."
The knife Xi Shi had sharpened for so long plunged into his chest, the blade instantly piercing through skin and flesh, sinking deep.
The unfamiliar resistance and the warm, rust-scented liquid made Xi Shi's eyes fly open in horror.
He must have been in pain—he caught his breath before speaking: "See, you don't actually enjoy doing this kind of thing, do you?"
Xi Shi's tears spilled over.
He even praised her with a hint of laughter in his voice: "Did you sharpen the knife yourself? Nice work—pretty sharp."
Xi Shi felt the blood on her hands growing heavier, weeping helplessly.
His tone remained calm: "You won't die."
"It's fine."
"Don't be afraid."
…
Xi Shi woke with a gasp, panting as if starved of air, bolting upright from the hospital bed.
The private ward was sealed off by heavy blackout curtains, the pitch-dark space lit only by the faint glow of the call button's palm-sized screen.
She was drowsy and drained, with no sense of time, feeling as though she were still trapped in some nightmare.
In the restless sleep of these past years, Xi Shi had experienced countless false awakenings.
One dream nested inside another—this feeling was not unfamiliar to her.
Xi Shi had once had a dream-within-a-dream that felt terrifyingly real. In it, she woke with a start amid her own gasping breaths, only to find herself lying in the bedroom where she'd grown up.
From the kitchen came the rhythmic thud of chopping. In disbelief, she threw off the covers and rushed in, and there she saw her grandmother's back as she chopped dumpling filling.
Her grandmother said: "Xiao Shi's awake? I found cheap pork and fresh bok choy at the market, so I thought I'd come back and make you some dumplings."
Xi Shi's grandmother was very thin, not the kind of elder with a particularly kindly face.
Yet Xi Shi desperately wanted to cry.
Everything in the kitchen was so familiar.
And that old, worn knife that Xi Shi had sharpened over and over again—still dull as ever—lay quietly in the basket holding the iron spatula and scissors.
In that dream-within-a-dream, Xi Shi had felt the steam from the boiling water, seen the fingerprints pressed into the dumpling wrappers her grandmother pinched shut, smelled the fragrant filling, and could even make out her grandmother's graying hair and the flour smudged on her clothes.
She truly believed that was reality.
And those cruel, sorrowful, hopeless realities—perhaps they were just a terrifying dream.
When Xi Shi walked toward her grandmother, full of hope, she found the everyday scene growing more and more hazy. No matter how wide she opened her eyes, she could no longer see it clearly.
Ah, so it was still a dream.
Xi Shi deeply dreaded dreams-within-dreams.
She curled onto her side, hugging herself, reminding herself not to believe in anyone or anything that appeared.
They were fake.
All of it was a lie.
It wasn't until Xi Shi made out the silhouette of a man sitting by the hospital bed in the gloom that she was certain she was dreaming again.
His elbows rested on his thighs, his features and form nearly blending into the pitch-black space.
He seemed to be silently watching her.
Xi Shi stared at the figure and murmured: "It's you again."
Knowing it was him, she actually felt relieved.
Generally, dreams featuring this meddlesome madman who stuck his nose where it didn't belong were never too terrible.
Xi Shi closed her eyes, reassured.
On that dim, murky night, he had pulled the blade from his own chest and joked that he'd keep it as a souvenir for her.
Then, the evening of the next day, Xi Shi—moving like a walking corpse—kicked a bulging manila envelope at her front door. Mechanically, she picked it up and opened it.
The envelope contained a detailed record of many things:
How to claim her grandmother's funeral subsidy and pension; how to transfer the assets under her grandmother's name to her own; how to handle the school transfer and contact the new school; how to apply for financial aid…
Every step even had clear notes on which documents were needed and who to contact.
It was nothing short of exhaustive.
Whoever left the envelope seemed to want to help Xi Shi, who had lost her only family, build a new framework for her life.
But she simply set the envelope down on the dining table where she'd shared countless meals with her grandmother, and with vacant eyes, crawled back into bed to curl up.
About two or three days later, Xi Shi was roused by the ringing of the home landline.
In a daze, she picked up, and heard laughter and breathing on the other end.
She realized almost instantly: "It's you."
The person on the phone seemed to chuckle: "So you do remember me."
Xi Shi was still wearing the clothes she'd had on the day she'd planned to kill Chen Lintian. She looked at the dried bloodstains on her cuffs and said nothing.
The person said calmly: "There were two people who wronged you—Shen Meiyan and Chen Lintian."
Xi Shi still stayed silent.
The person told Xi Shi that Shen Meiyan's company had accounting problems, and the breakthrough lay with the company's CFO.
Then he played her a recording—one that captured Chen Lintian's voice berating students.
The voice on the phone remarked with amusement: "Seems your enemies aren't so flawless after all."
He coaxed slowly, "Don't you want to wait and see what kind of retribution they get?"
Xi Shi's eyes, lifeless as glass beads, gradually began to stir with vitality.
He said: "Xi Shi, don't seek death, and don't forgive."
It was that day Xi Shi pulled herself back together.
She followed the contents of that envelope to rebuild the framework of her life—handling the school transfer, taking on part-time jobs to earn money…
From the summer of her seventeenth year, she steeled herself and planned carefully, beginning a new life that appeared calm on the surface.
Xi Shi opened her eyes again and glanced at the figure in the darkness.
She thought, if she had his phone number, she might save his contact name as "Angel."
Because…
According to Lin Youhe, he was a rare angel in her life.
Xi Shi suddenly felt like telling this angel she had never met about that honest man, Lin Youhe.
But she was too exhausted, and in the end, she never spoke up.
Xi Shi only woke once in the middle of the night, muttered a few words in her sleep, then drifted back into a drowsy slumber.
In the morning, a nurse came in to deliver medication.
Lin Youhe tried to wake Xi Shi, but she kept her brows furrowed tightly, refusing to open her eyes, even attempting to bury her head beneath the pillow.
Xi Shi's examination report showed no improvement compared to a few months ago—some indicators were even worse than before, which gave Lin Youhe a headache—
The reference range for Vitamin D was 20-100 ng/mL.
Hers was only 9 ng/mL.
Not taking the medication was definitely not an option.
Lin Youhe sat down by the bed, leaned over, and forcibly propped up Xi Shi, who was as limp as if she had no bones. Pressing down on her jaw and teeth, he placed the medicine into her mouth.
He brought the straw of the thermos to her lips, and Xi Shi only took a small sip instinctively.
She was only able to maintain a sitting position thanks to the hand Lin Youhe had supporting her back. Seeming to realize it wasn't red wine, she frowned and leaned backward as she swallowed.
Her resistance was unmistakable.
The overly pale and fragile stretch of Xi Shi's neck might have moved, but her swallowing motion was so subtle it was barely perceptible.
Afraid the pill might not have gone down and could choke Xi Shi, Lin Youhe didn't dare let her lie down fully. He slipped his finger between her lips and teeth to check.
Xi Shi seemed very angry.
She struggled, trying to push it out with her tongue twice, but failed. Finally, having reached her limit, she bit down on Lin Youhe's fingertip.