It was supposedly the Start of Summer, but he still woke up to waves of coldness radiating through his body.
Lu Henqin curled his fingers slightly. The medical tape on the back of his hand pulled uncomfortably against his skin. As the medicine dripped in, he realized half of his arm was numb.
His eyes remained closed, pupils fluttering slightly beneath his lids as hushed whispers drifted into his ears:
“I suggested he stay in the hospital. For something like this to happen while he’s home alone—once could be called an accident, but how many times has it been now?”
“Yes, it was a small dose this time, but his stomach still had to be pumped. Why is he messing with that stuff for no reason? Can the family not afford a gardener anymore?”
“Fine, I won’t touch it next time,” Lu Henqin interjected abruptly, his voice sounding as if it had been roughened by sandpaper.
He frowned, then shut his mouth and fell silent as if disgusted by his own raspy tone.
The room went quiet for a moment before bursting into activity like a stone dropped into water.
“Oh, you’re finally awake? So, how was it? Was drinking organophosphorus pesticide exhilarating?”
Lu Henqin knitted his brows and lifted his eyelids, looking at the sarcastic face before him. He glanced at the IV bag by the bed. “Bai Haoying, you can leave once the injection is done.”
Doctor Bai, who had been moving quietly for fear of disturbing the patient, no longer had any such concerns. He pulled a chair back, intentionally letting it scrape loudly against the carpet, and curled his lip. “Spoken like someone who hasn’t kicked the bucket yet. Fine.”
While bickering, Bai Haoying skillfully tore open the packaging of a disposable syringe, prepared the medicine, and drew it up. The needle pierced the skin, and with a push of his thumb, the medicine was delivered fast and hard.
His numb arm finally had some reaction. Lu Henqin’s wrist spasmed slightly, and he squeezed his eyes shut.
Bai Haoying glanced sideways at his friend, intending to throw a few more snide remarks. However, his gaze suddenly caught the twisted, winding scars on Lu Henqin’s wrist, and the glibness he’d had since childhood instantly vanished.
The scars on the inner wrist were clearly years old. But because the cuts had been so clean and ruthless at the time, even after stitches, one could still see the original wounds had been deep enough to reveal bone. The rough, dark-red edges of the flesh protruded slightly against his pale skin, making them impossible to ignore.
It had been three years.
Bai Haoying’s playful demeanor faded. “While you were unconscious, I gave you atropine every thirty minutes. You’re a lucky kid; you’re mostly fine. But the side effects of atropine are quite obvious, so it’s normal for you to have a dry mouth, a fast heart rate, and blurred consciousness right now.”
After a pause, he couldn’t help but warn, “Don’t do anything stupid again.”
Lu Henqin let out a long, helpless sigh. Why did everyone think he was trying to commit suicide? He glanced at Aunt Qiu, who was nervously twisting the corner of her shirt, and explained helplessly, “I told you, I just forgot to wash my hands and accidentally ingested some.”
He was still hooked up to an IV; the words held no credibility. No one in the room reacted.
Lu Henqin looked away, too tired to waste any more words.
As usual, there was a round of earnest counseling and detailed instructions. Lu Henqin listened half-heartedly, offering only a couple of terse responses.
“In short, get more sun and interact with people more.” Bai Haoying glanced around, and Aunt Qiu immediately understood. She hurried to turn on the television, finally bringing some lively atmosphere into the stark, minimalist room.
[The Social Democratic Party recently reaffirmed its policy stance on the universal welfare system. Party representative Zhong Yi actively sought support on the issue, emphasizing that through…]
It was truly a case of touching a sore spot. Out of nearly a hundred channels, why did the overseas news have to be the one that appeared the moment the TV was turned on?
Bai Haoying’s eyelids jumped wildly as he instinctively looked toward the bed.
Sure enough, Lu Henqin, who had been listless a moment ago, slowly sat up straight. His sickly lethargy seemed to vanish in an instant. He stared intently, his expression cold, at the figure on the screen.
Aunt Qiu, not understanding the situation, muttered about going to cook dinner. Lu Henqin’s gaze remained nailed to the screen, his expression growing colder the more he watched. Without moving his upper body, his left hand reached toward the headboard. With a sharp click, he shut the television off directly.
“I’m going to sleep for a bit.” As he pulled his hand back, he also pressed the button for the curtains. Dark shadows reclaimed the room. He was truly kicking them out now.
Bai Haoying could do nothing with him. “I’ll leave the medicine here. I’ll come back tomorrow to set up your IV.”
Lu Henqin closed his eyes quietly, taking that as his response.
When he woke again, it was already two in the morning. Lu Henqin was roused by the sudden torrential rain lashing against the window glass. Frequent streaks of silver-white lightning pierced through the heavy curtains, and the booming thunder sounded as if it were exploding right above his head.
The rain was too heavy for him to sleep. Remembering Bai Haoying’s earnest advice before leaving, he finally got out of bed sluggishly, deciding to eat some porridge and take his medicine as prescribed.
The massive house was pitch black. Lu Henqin shuffled in his slippers, not even bothering to turn on the lights. The house was empty anyway; besides the essential furniture, there were almost no personal items, making it look like a beautiful but useless model home. He wouldn’t hit his legs even if he walked in the dark.
Just as he turned the corner of the second-floor stairs, a “beep” cut through the muffled thunder with startling clarity.
It was the sound of the electronic lock being disengaged.
Lu Henqin’s brow arched slightly as he came to a sudden halt.
Aunt Qiu had gone home after making dinner. Very few people knew the code to this house’s electronic lock.
He stood silently in the middle of the stairs for a while, waiting patiently for this uninvited guest to make another noise.
From the entryway of the first floor inward, a series of dense water droplets pattered onto the marble floor tiles. It was subtle, hidden by the sound of the downpour outside.
Lu Henqin slowly rubbed his fingertips together. If one didn’t listen carefully, it would indeed be easy to overlook that “It” had slipped inside.
Being broken into in the middle of the night by a stranger should have been terrifying, especially since this property was somewhat isolated with no “neighbors” to speak of. Yet, Lu Henqin didn’t have the slightest ripple of emotion.
I’ve given you three minutes, he thought coldly. If he went back up nine steps, he could get his gun.
When he descended the stairs again, his arm hung loosely at his side, the gun held naturally against his thigh. The safety was off. The moment he saw the person, he could send this trespasser to meet God.
Thus, Lu Henqin walked down the last step in his slippers and soft cotton loungewear, completely unguarded. He was confident to the point of arrogance.
Unless it was a professional, few could draw a gun faster than him. If there was such a person, or if he performed poorly—
The horrific scars on his inner wrist began to itch faintly, as if thin insects were restlessly crawling into his veins. It was the rainy season again…
If he performed poorly, that would be fine too. It would be fate.
And no one would spend all day saying he was distracted or that he was always thinking of suicide… it was utter nonsense.
Lu Henqin stopped before entering the living room. He tilted his chin and looked toward the distance; someone was standing by the floor-to-ceiling window.
The curtains were neatly gathered on both sides. Amidst the orderly furniture and decor, the only living thing among the inanimate objects was exceptionally conspicuous.
The person had their back to him, one hand pressed against the glass to steady themselves. They were leaned over, wiping rain from their legs. Where “It” had walked, a trail of wet footprints had been left behind, like a long tail.
Lu Henqin raised his gun, easily locking onto the target. For about ten seconds, the person remained completely unaware.
Tch…
If someone was too useless, it really was easy to develop an “annoyance with stupidity.” Lu Henqin felt even more bored and let out a cough that was neither light nor heavy, as if teasing them.
A crack suddenly tore through the sky, followed by a flash of blinding white light. A moment later, thunder roared, completely swallowing the sound of the cough.
The person’s profile was briefly illuminated. The lightning stretched her shadow infinitely, casting it onto the walls of the empty house like a wildly growing branch. In the final instant before the light died, a drop of rain rolled off the wet hair plastered to her face.
With a patter, it hit the floor.
The finger on the trigger suddenly froze. The composure he’d had just a moment ago seemed to be shattered by the booming thunder. Lu Henqin’s entire arm holding the gun felt as if it were suddenly tied to a thousand-pound boulder, dragging heavily downward.
All sounds in the surroundings vanished, as if he had suddenly dropped into a vacuum. Even his breath caught. All his blood surged to his brain and then completely solidified. That name was stuck firmly in his throat; he couldn’t call it out no matter how he tried.
Another flash of lightning came. The person finally noticed something was wrong and turned her face, meeting his gaze directly.
Lu Henqin blinked slowly, finally able to see her face clearly and completely.
Three years had passed, and she looked exactly as she did in his memory.
Drenched in rain, she slowly stood up straight. Her soaked clothes clung to her shoulders, looking thin and frail. Her pupils were dark and bright, like stones resting at the bottom of water. When she looked at someone, she was calm and resilient, possessing a sort of rugged integrity.
After a long silence of staring at each other, she didn’t offer a single word of explanation, nor did she seem to have any intention of calling his name. Before she had even wiped the water from her body, she took a step toward him.
Lu Henqin stared at her fixedly, feeling as if the air around her was warped and distorted. His brain was on the verge of experiencing the hallucinatory sensation of a cognitive malfunction. His heart skipped beats, each one faster than the last. He simply could not move his gaze from her face.
A reunion after a long parting. The days had been long enough to grind all love and hatred into gray, blurred memories. He had thought the long time ahead would pass just as tediously, day after day.
He had prepared himself for the two of them never to cross paths again for the rest of their lives, using these three boring years to do so.
But when he was completely unprepared, she had once again forced her way in without a word of greeting.
He had too much to say, but when the moment came, his mind was a complete blank. His Adam’s apple bobbed, but no words could be squeezed out.
She was still walking toward him, making no sound as she stepped on the floor.
Lu Henqin was forced to glance at her feet. She was barefoot and gaunt. The rain had soaked her skin into a bloodless porcelain white; she looked very cold.
He subconsciously knitted his brows. The hand holding the gun never lowered, but his aim had long since drifted to God knows where.
She was a bit too calm.
Compared to him, she was so calm it was as if they had just seen each other yesterday, as if this was merely an insignificant reunion.
The nameless anger that Lu Henqin felt rising after the initial shock burned even hotter because of her calmness. So much so that when she stood before him, he only uttered a cold word of dismissal:
“The door is over there, Xia Tingchan.”
Xia Tingchan acted as if she hadn’t heard him. She didn’t stop, brushing past him and walking toward the kitchen with practiced familiarity to pour herself a glass of hot water. As the steam rose, she held the cup with both hands and pressed it against her face, letting out a comfortable breath.
Lu Henqin lowered his hand. The gun spun nimbly in his palm before being caught by the trigger guard on his index finger, dangling in the air. His short-circuited brain finally began to process things. He stared at the dripping trail of rainwater and let out a cold laugh, finding it utterly ironic.
She had never been to this house before, and there had been no news of her during these three years. Now that she was in a sorry state, down and out, she actually had the gall to come to him to escape the rain as if nothing had happened?
Did she think that after everything that had transpired, he was still a dog at her beck and call?
Xia Tingchan really did look cold. Her fingers were slightly shriveled from being soaked in rain. She blew on the hot water and drank it quickly. Only then did she find the time to glance at him again.
It wasn’t a timid, fawning, “sorry to trouble you” kind of look. It was simply a flat gaze that swept over him because a person happened to be standing there.
Then, as if she couldn’t read the room at all, she asked without any reservation, “Lu Henqin, do you have a towel?”
“No.” Lu Henqin’s eyelids were half-drooped as he leaned diagonally against the kitchen doorway, refusing to take a single step inside as if defending against a predatory beast.
He hadn’t intended to answer, but she had always been stubborn. If he didn’t directly express his disgust, she simply wouldn’t understand; she was as wooden as a stone.
But after years of not seeing each other, Xia Tingchan’s excessive ability to be self-consistent had improved, reaching an absurdity that surpassed his imagination.
She put down the cup and walked straight out. She turned as she passed him and then headed directly upstairs with a clear goal.
“Xia Tingchan!” he warned, suppressing his anger.
It was like seeing a ghost. She seemed perfectly at home in the dark house, accurately entering his bathroom. Before he could follow her in, she had taken his towel and draped it over her head to dry her long, soaked hair.
“Do you really think this is your home? That’s my towel.”
“I know.” A pair of clear eyes peeked out from under the towel.
Lu Henqin was about to sarcastically remark that their relationship was not one where they could share a towel, but his stomach suddenly began to cramp in waves, as if a pair of hands were ruthlessly squeezing his internal organs.
He frowned and pressed his abdomen, but quickly moved his hand away. The pain reminded him that he hadn’t taken his medicine yet. It also allowed him to calm down from the chaos caused by the sudden reunion. The fact that a perfectly good night had been disturbed was all because he was now entangled with this woman who had inexplicably barged back into his life. It was a complete waste of time.
He had made a mistake once; there was no way he would fall again.
Lu Henqin slowed his breathing and placed the gun not-too-heavily on the vanity. He remained a few steps away from her. His standing position, far beyond normal social distance, made his already handsome but unfriendly face look even more formidable. Finally, he picked out some harsh words to throw at her, questioning her word by word:
“By what right do you think you can touch my things?”
Xia Tingchan’s hand drying her hair paused, frozen in mid-air for a long time. The towel hung down, one side longer than the other, obscuring her profile. She was dazed for a long while, so long that the towel slipped lopsidedly from her head before she hurriedly caught it.
Lu Henqin’s eyelids pressed down thinly, unmoved. “Three minutes. Leave my house, or I’m calling the police.”
Xia Tingchan stopped speaking. She was silent for a moment before unfolding the crumpled towel, intending to hang it back on the towel rack—
“Why are you hanging it back?”
He raised his hand and pointed toward a certain spot in the bathroom. Xia Tingchan, familiar with his temperament, guessed the answer before he could speak. She stepped back two paces with great fluidity, and the sensor trash can diligently opened its lid. She then casually tossed the towel inside.
After throwing it, she looked up, only to see the ugly expression on Lu Henqin’s face. He had been pointing toward the laundry basket.
Xia Tingchan was a bit confused. “Ah? Did you still want it?”
Those words seemed to strike a nerve. Lu Henqin narrowed his eyes slightly. The gaze leaking from the shadow of his lashes grew colder inch by inch. He slowly lowered his arm, his gaze lingering on her face for a long time, indifferent and arrogant.
He had no more expressions to give. He stepped aside to let her through, coldly spitting out a few words: “You have one minute left.”
“Okay. Sorry for the intrusion. Goodbye.” Xia Tingchan always had a high level of awareness regarding deadlines. She was still barefoot; when she walked quickly, she made a slight tapping sound against the floor tiles.
Lu Henqin heard it. He frowned as if he wanted to say something but forced himself to stop. Finally, he turned his face away, not looking at her from beginning to end.
The irritating sound of dripping rain was finally gone from the house, but the rain outside showed no signs of letting up.
She was gone.
After a long while, Lu Henqin finally exhaled with effort, pressing his left hand firmly against his abdomen. His stomach was hurting more and more. The priority should be to gulp down a few mouthfuls of porridge and get his medicine, but his footsteps somehow drifted toward the entryway.
He stared vacantly at the wet footprints on the floor tiles, feeling a sudden flare of irritation.
Without any logical connection, he thought of a folding umbrella Aunt Qiu usually kept on the cabinet.
That umbrella was a bit old. He’d said long ago that it should be replaced, but Aunt Qiu was frugal by nature and said it wasn’t broken and could still be used. So, it had stayed.
If the umbrella were lost, he could buy Aunt Qiu a new one.
The stifling air in his chest suddenly seemed to find an outlet. Between taking his medicine and throwing away the umbrella, Lu Henqin chose to first discard the umbrella he had long been dissatisfied with.
He hadn’t walked this fast even when he went down with a gun to catch a trespasser. Lu Henqin pressed his abdomen hard as if fighting violence with violence; the pain made his mind slightly clearer. He strode to the door, grabbed the umbrella with one hand, and shoved the door open forcefully with the other. But his foot accidentally stepped on something.
He let out a tch. Looking down, he suddenly realized it was Xia Tingchan’s shoes. The laces were limp on both sides, looking like an old boat that had been flooded.
Lu Henqin’s mind suddenly exploded, and his temples throbbed violently.
She wasn’t wearing shoes? Because he had only given her one minute?
Was she a blockhead?!
Ignoring everything else, Lu Henqin, both angry and agitated, raised his still-raspy voice and shouted into the dense veil of rain, “Xia Tingchan! Take all your things with you!”
The rain grew heavier, like a tightly woven net that made it hard to breathe. He couldn’t see if anyone was lingering in the distance. Lu Henqin quickly opened the umbrella and bent down to pick up her shoes—
His fingers suddenly passed through the soaked shoes, which shattered like a reflection in the water.
Thunder boomed, and his head throbbed in unison. In his shock, the umbrella in his hand was swept away by a gust of wind, rolling into the courtyard.
He remained frozen in his bent posture. After a long while, he finally looked up with the effort of a drowning man. There was nothing outside the door, including those wet footprints.
There was only rain.
The heavy rain that seemed as if it would never stop.