The light outside the floor-to-ceiling windows gradually receded, plunging the living room completely into darkness. Shi Bei was using her phone to read an interesting research paper she had just found when the surroundings suddenly lit up.
“Fix your bad habit of not liking to turn on the lights.”
Kong Lingrou stood near the wall, while the little dog automatically turned into the bathroom by the door for a clean-up.
Setting the takeout dinner on the dining table, she said:
“Someone will be over in a bit—”
Before she could finish her sentence, the indoor intercom system rang.
Kong Lingrou went over to answer and confirm, then continued: “They’re delivering two wheelchairs. You’ll take the electric one to school tomorrow, and use the manual one at home.”
…Indeed, her place was huge.
The hallway was wide enough for two wheelchairs to pass side-by-side, so getting around solely on crutches was quite exhausting.
“Why are you so good to me, Kong Lingrou?”
“I’m not.” Kong Lingrou looked directly into her face. Her eyes held no laughter, yet her lips curved politely into a smile as she said, “I just like to be in control of everything. Have you forgotten?”
Her words were like a breeze in late autumn.
One could smell the chill at the tip of their nose, yet there was an indescribable, lingering tenderness.
Shi Bei remained silent.
Before opening the door, Kong Lingrou said to her: “Eat dinner first.”
Shi Bei made her way sluggishly to the dining area. Through the open door, she watched Kong Lingrou speaking Japanese so standard that no accent could be detected. She could also catch a glimpse of the property staff member who had accompanied them up.
While she stared at Kong Lingrou, the little dog hiding under the table stared back at her without blinking.
All of a sudden, Shi Bei caught its gaze.
She tried to initiate a friendly gesture: “Shake hands?”
The pup remained motionless.
Frowning, Shi Bei chose to sit down first. She then leaned over to align her view with the dog, holding out her hand to try asking once in Japanese: “Akushu?”
The little dog’s ear twitched. It tilted its head, seemingly having missed what was said.
“Akushu!” Shi Bei repeated adaptively.
The pup suddenly shook its legs, turned around, and trotted away.
Shi Bei: “?”
The moment Kong Lingrou returned to the dining room, she saw Shi Bei clambering out awkwardly from under the table.
“Lele only understands Chinese commands.”
She hadn’t expected to be overhead.
A bit embarrassed, Shi Bei gave an ‘oh’, unpacking her cutlery set while pretending to focus on her food.
“Also, your stress accent was wrong. If you get the accent wrong frequently, people won’t understand what you’re saying. We won’t do written word dictation anymore from now on—I’ll speak Chinese, and you recite it back directly. If the accent is wrong, it’s counted as wrong.”
“…Okay.” Shi Bei pointed at the dog and asked, “So can she shake hands?”
“No, I don’t teach commands like that.”
“Then since I don’t have a tail, how am I supposed to express friendliness to her? Why does she keep staring at me, looking over at me from time to time from the beginning until now?”
“It’s probably because she hasn’t seen anyone in this house other than me, so she doesn’t know how to react. She can only carefully observe you for a while first to assess the situation.”
Upon hearing this, Shi Bei raised her face in surprise, her eyes turning toward her.
“Has no one ever visited your home?”
“Stop asking questions.” Lowering her eyes, Kong Lingrou unhurriedly opened the food packaging. “After eating, go test out your electric wheelchair. You have an early class tomorrow, so make less noise when heading out and don’t disturb my sleep.”
“…Oh.”
There is a saying in Japanese: just by resting your chin on your hand, the angle from which you view the world changes completely.
This was precisely the case right now.
With her cheek resting on her palm as she gazed into the distance, Shi Bei realized for the first time that there were so many restaurants with French signboards along the street. She had originally thought those dimly lit shops were all bars.
People shuttled to and fro around her, yet the street remained quiet and orderly.
There was a sense of silent bustling.
From where she lived, it took only a six-minute walk to reach the elevator entrance of the electric train station.
Turning her head, she asked Kong Lingrou behind her once more: “Are you really going to walk me to school yourself?”
Just yesterday, she had firmly instructed her not to make noise in the morning to avoid waking her. Yet today, as soon as Shi Bei woke up, she heard a ‘ding’ from the direction of the kitchen.
Dazed, she went over to see what was happening.
Kong Lingrou was already seated at the dining table, spreading jam onto her bread.
Without a clear reason for her sudden change of mind, she declared she would take her to school. Shi Bei tried to decline, but couldn’t get out of it.
When asked why, Kong Lingrou simply said: If you’re going to help someone, see them through to the end.
After saying that, she even gave a cold laugh.
That vibe—resembling a police drama where someone was going out to eliminate a target—made it impossible for Shi Bei to say anything in reply.
The early morning breeze blew against her face, and Shi Bei closed her eyes.
Being pushed to school by Kong Lingrou gave her the feeling of an emperor heading to an early morning court session, yet Kong Lingrou’s thoughtfulness made her a bit anxious and uneasy. Perhaps she was a puppet emperor instead.
At this moment, Kong Lingrou was in a terrible mood.
Like Shi Bei, she kept a standard night-owl schedule and almost never woke up early.
However, she had a nightmare last night.
She dreamed that the moment Shi Bei stepped out, she was hit by a car at the very first intersection after turning the corner from the apartment building. The details were frighteningly realistic; even after opening her eyes, the urgent voice over the phone in the dream felt as if it had just sounded by her ear.
It brought back many long-buried memories.
As a child, Shi Bei used to walk while waving her hands around. Once, when passing by a low railing, completely oblivious to her surroundings, her hand slammed onto a piece of sharp sheet metal with a clatter, leaving it covered in blood.
Even when walking normally, a low-hanging branch from the roadside would scratch a bloody streak across her cheek as she walked by.
The moment that left the deepest impression occurred when Kong Lingrou was in a bad mood and wanted to find a deserted place to be alone quietly, yet Shi Bei insisted on following her.
Her temper flared up at the time, and she reached out to push her.
She had indeed used some force.
As it turned out, Shi Bei stepped on the edge of the flower bed, lost her balance, and tumbled inside.
At that moment, she struggled to raise her face. A large gash on her forehead was bleeding outward, the injured spot merely two or three centimeters from her eye.
Sustaining a bloody hole, she was still trying to smile at her.
In Kong Lingrou’s memory, that was the only time she could be considered anxious and panicked to the point of fear.
Shi Bei’s reappearance was like casting a intense beam of light into a dark, pitch-black tunnel—illuminating everything simply and naturally that Kong Lingrou had worked so hard for so long to hide away in the dark.
Kong Lingrou, who had only fallen asleep at two in the morning, could no longer sleep after seven because of this dream.
She had no choice but to get up.
The platform for the Oedo Line was built exceedingly deep underground, requiring quite a bit of wandering around to find the elevator. After boarding an elevator and taking it down, they actually had to exit and transfer to another elevator to continue down.
Shi Bei began to feel fortunate that Kong Lingrou was accompanying her today; otherwise, she wouldn’t have understood the Japanese instructions nearby at all, nor would she have comprehended why one had to transfer from elevator to elevator just to reach the right platform.
After navigating around for half the morning, they finally arrived at the correct platform.
The moment the train doors opened, commuters packed at the doorway surged out like water after a plug is pulled.
“Kong Lingrou, is this your first time riding the train?”
Staring at her reflection in the train door guardrail—rarely looking frantic—Shi Bei felt a sudden urge to laugh for some reason.
“Of course not.” Kong Lingrou finally spotted where the priority seating car was marked.
She pushed Shi Bei over, pondering once more whether there were any decent parking areas near the school that could guarantee parking the car within the limited time when leaving right on the dot.
Parking spaces in bustling commercial districts were miserably scarce, and roadside paid parking lots even had spaces in single digits. Illegal parking incurred not only fines, but would also result in the car being towed away.
Because the campus area was extremely compact, even professors who rented parking spaces were only allowed to register a single vehicle.
One day, Kong Lingrou’s professor happened to drive a different family car to teach. After being intercepted at the gate, they presented their employee badge to explain the reason, but the security office still refused entry.
The rules were set strictly, and those enforcing them were equally unyielding, leaving little room for Kong Lingrou to maneuver.
“What are you thinking about?” Shi Bei said, “Every time you want to plan something that isn’t going particularly smoothly, your expression turns extremely grim and terrifying.”
“…Thinking about how to drive the car into the school.”
“So it’s that difficult? Looks like in Tokyo, simply spending money doesn’t make it easy to break the rules.”
“Indeed.” Kong Lingrou smiled.
Actually, there was one simplest solution: leave earlier and search for empty parking spaces.
There were bound to be empty spots scattered around, but Kong Lingrou disliked such randomness; she preferred to buy a piece of land specifically for parking outright.
Compared to those exiting the station, there weren’t as many people entering, and with commuters on both sides consciously avoiding them, Kong Lingrou pushed Shi Bei into the train car with relative ease.
“The train only takes two stops, taking half an hour altogether including the walk, but walking directly is only two kilometers.” The train car was extremely quiet, forcing Shi Bei to lower her voice and lean close to her to say, “If you’re really that worried about me going to school alone, why don’t we just walk together instead?”