There was still half a kettle of water left. Shen Qingqing poured some into a glass and tested the temperature. Not too hot, not too cold, just right for drinking.
Holding the glass, she walked over and crouched in front of Huo Yan, stuffing it into his hands.
“Drink some water and soothe your throat. Your voice sounds like you swallowed sandpaper.”
Huo Yan’s fingers touched the glass and stopped.
The glass was warm.
The heat seeped through the lace wrappings into his palm, neither hot nor cold, roughly forty degrees.
His thumb slowly traced the rim, his fingertip brushing over the rough mold line along the edge of the cheap glass.
This woman had poured him water.
The last time she shoved a cup into his hands, it had been freshly boiled water at one hundred degrees. His entire palm had blistered white from the burn, and he hadn’t been able to clench a fist for three days.
He lifted the glass beneath his nose and sniffed carefully.
No smell.
No bitterness from dissolved medicine, no sharp alkaline scent from detergent, just plain boiled water.
But the more ordinary it seemed, the more numb the back of his scalp became.
She had stuffed the money back into his pocket, washed his hands, bandaged his wounds, signed him up for a massage class, and now she was even bringing him water.
When one person suddenly starts treating another well, either they want something bigger in return, or the water itself is the knife.
His lips touched the rim, but he didn’t drink.
He felt the warmth of the water against his mouth. His tongue touched the surface briefly before retreating almost immediately.
Not bitter. Not strange. No unusual taste.
Still, he didn’t swallow.
Nearby, Shen Qingqing was sorting through the pile of counterfeit bags, separating the sellable items from the worthless ones while muttering calculations under her breath.
“Dried rice noodles are two yuan per pound, eggs are one yuan for two, bean sprouts are the cheapest, one yuan for a huge handful, and if I sweet-talk the vegetable seller a little, they might throw in scallions for free…”
Her attention was completely fixed on the cracked phone screen while her fingers tapped rapidly against the calculator.
Huo Yan held the glass quietly, his thumb and forefinger pressing against either side.
Beneath his fingertips was the texture of cheap glass. Thin. Hard. Uneven under pressure.
Easy to shatter. Slowly, his grip tightened.
Crack!
The sound was soft, like thin ice breaking beneath a shoe.
The glass split down the middle. The wall collapsed inward, shards driving deep into his palm as warm water streamed through his fingers, mixed with blood, dripping onto his knees.
He didn’t let go.
All five fingers remained clenched around the shattered bottom half of the cup. Glass fragments embedded themselves into the lace wrappings, soaking the black fabric dark red with blood.
It hurt.
Three shards were lodged in his palm. The largest piece had pierced sideways into the fleshy muscle below his thumb, wedged between flesh and bone.
Yet his expression never changed. The corner of his lips even curled upward slightly.
He was waiting.
Waiting for the woman to hear the noise, turn around in shock, then erupt into curses.
She would yell at him for wasting water, for breaking the cup, for injuring his hand again and slowing down his ability to work.
Then she would slap him, or drag the broken glass across his face.
That would make sense. That would be her.
At the sound of the crack, Shen Qingqing looked up from the pile of fake bags.
The first thing she noticed was the water spreading across the floor.
Pink! Still spreading outward.
Her gaze traveled upward toward Huo Yan’s hands.
The lace wrappings were completely soaked through with blood. Jagged shards protruded from between his fingers while water and blood dripped steadily onto his pants.
Shen Qingqing’s brain went blank for half a second.
Then she exploded.
“Oh my God! My ancestors above!”
The scream was loud enough to pierce through walls, even more explosive than Wang Guihua pounding on the door earlier.
The counterfeit bag in her hand crashed onto the floor as she practically crawled over in panic, banging her knee painfully against the ground hard enough to make her suck in a breath. She ignored it completely and grabbed Huo Yan’s wrist.
“Let go! Hurry up and let go!”
Huo Yan didn’t move. He was still waiting.
Waiting for the next words.
“If your hands get ruined, how are you supposed to carry cement? How are you supposed to learn massage? Is there a hole in your brain?!”
Shen Qingqing’s voice cracked from shouting as she pried at his fingers one by one. She didn’t have enough strength, so in her desperation she nearly climbed onto his lap, using both hands to force open one of his.
“Let go, let go, let go! There’s glass stuck in there, doesn’t it hurt?!”
One finger finally loosened.
His index finger.
A bloodied shard dropped from between his fingers, bounced once against the floor, and rolled away.
He neither resisted nor cooperated, simply remaining rigid while she pried his fingers apart one by one like breaking open crab legs.
Middle finger.
Ring finger, Pinky.
Finally, the thumb.
The largest shard was still embedded in his palm. Shen Qingqing sucked in a sharp breath the moment she saw it.
“That thing’s buried at least a centimeter deep…”
Her voice trembled now, along with her fingers, as she pinched the edge of the shard between her thumb and forefinger and slowly pulled.
“Hiss—”
The sound came from Shen Qingqing herself, not Huo Yan.
The shard tore out a piece of flesh when it came free, exposing pale tissue beneath as blood burst from the wound in a sudden rush.
Shen Qingqing’s eyes reddened instantly.
“What is wrong with you? Did the cup offend you or something? Huh?” she scolded while continuing to pick out glass fragments, her fingernails digging through the lace wrappings to pluck out tiny shards lodged within the fabric one by one.
A sliver of glass sliced her fingernail open, but she didn’t even notice. Blood dripped from her fingertips onto the back of his hand, their blood mingling together.
“You did this on purpose, didn’t you?” she shouted.
Huo Yan didn’t answer.
The tension in his body had completely vanished.
Not relaxation! Exhaustion!
She was scolding him. But she was scolding him for the wrong reasons.
She wasn’t yelling about wasted water, dirty floors, or him being useless.
She was angry because he didn’t care about hurting himself.
That logic spun through his head three times without making sense.
“Any more pieces left?” Shen Qingqing flipped his hand over, palm facing upward, and leaned in close to inspect it. Her eyes narrowed, her eyelashes nearly brushing his fingers.
Her warm breath drifted across the still-bleeding wound in his palm.
“Is there anywhere else still stuck with glass? Say something!”
“No more.”
His voice emerged hoarse and rough from deep in his throat, as though something were lodged there.
By the time Shen Qingqing finished removing the larger fragments, both their hands were covered in blood, his and hers indistinguishable.
The lace wrappings were ruined now, soaked through and clinging wetly to his skin.
Still muttering curses under her breath, Shen Qingqing untied the bloodied lace and tossed it onto the floor.
The wounds were fully exposed now. A long cut stretched across his palm, accompanied by three puncture wounds and two scratches along the side of his fingers. Blood continued seeping out without stopping.
“What are you, a hedgehog? Who crushes a glass cup barehanded?”
Her voice had gone hoarse from yelling, the trembling edge in her tone carrying lingering fear.
Huo Yan lowered his head, those sightless eyes fixed in her direction.
The speed at which she rushed over. The strength she used prying apart his fingers.
The rhythm of her breathing while picking out the glass. The trembling in her voice while she scolded him.
All of it had been real.
Not once had she paused to think about what expression she should fake next.
There had been no trace of calculation at all.
She had genuinely panicked.
She was worried about him.
Worried about him.
The realization struck him like another shard of glass, sharper than the one lodged in his palm earlier, piercing straight into a place inside him he had believed had long since died.
“You could at least move your mouth a little. Does it hurt or not?” Shen Qingqing tugged his sleeve impatiently.
“Doesn’t hurt.”
“Bullshit!” Shen Qingqing snapped. “A shard that big stabbed into your hand and you’re telling me it doesn’t hurt? Who are you trying to fool?”
Huo Yan’s Adam’s apple bobbed.
She was accusing him of lying. She cared whether he was hurting.
He had tested many people before.
Back at the Huo Family, when his stepmother brought him soup, he pretended the bowl burned his hand. Her first reaction had been checking whether the soup spilled.
When his half-brother handed him medicine, he pretended to swallow it. The other man’s first reaction had been checking whether he had hidden the pills.
Only this woman, upon seeing him bleed, rushed over immediately to remove the glass.
She hadn’t even noticed her own fingernail splitting open, hadn’t realized she was bleeding too.
Suddenly, he lifted his hand and grabbed her fingers.
Shen Qingqing froze.
Huo Yan’s thumb brushed against the cut beside her fingernail, where blood still seeped out slowly.
“You’re bleeding too,” he said quietly.
Shen Qingqing glanced down and finally noticed the cut on her finger. Half her fingernail had cracked, and a tiny glass splinter was embedded beneath the skin.
“This? It’s nothing. Just a scratch.”
She pulled her hand back, bit down with her teeth to yank the tiny shard free, then spat it onto the floor.
Huo Yan’s hand remained suspended briefly in midair, the sensation of her fingers still lingering against his fingertips.
Her fingers were slender, the bones small and delicate, the skin thin, with a rough layer of calluses at the tips, nothing like the hands that once wore three layers of nail polish.
He slowly withdrew his hand and clenched it lightly. The movement tugged painfully at the wound in his palm, making his fingers tremble.
This pain was different from before.
The old pain had always been dull and heavy, something he could endure until it passed.
But this pain drilled into his bones, carrying a strange feeling he couldn’t describe.
Shen Qingqing dragged another ragged T-shirt from beneath the bed, bit the sleeve between her teeth, and tore it into strips to rewrap his hands.
She kept scolding him the entire time without pause.
“From now on, stay away from glass. Use plastic cups for drinking. No, forget that, use a bowl. A stainless steel bowl. I’ll buy you one from the two-yuan shop tomorrow.”
“And no more carrying cement or steel bars either. Tomorrow you’re coming obediently with me to the market.”
“If you dare wreck your hands again, I’ll fight you myself, believe it or not.”
Huo Yan said nothing.
His lips were pressed tightly together, his jaw tense, his breathing noticeably rougher.
After tying the final knot, Shen Qingqing flipped his hands over to inspect her work.
The wrappings were crooked and uneven, tied with three dead knots. One section loosened, so she leaned down and tightened it with her teeth, her lips accidentally brushing against the back of his hand.
Warm! Huo Yan’s entire arm jolted as though struck by electricity.
His fingers curled sharply, grabbing the loose tail of the cloth strip.
Shen Qingqing didn’t notice. Once she finished, she clapped her hands together and stood up.
“Alright, don’t move. Wait until the bleeding stops first.”
She bent over to collect the broken glass pieces from the floor, sweeping them carefully into a pile against the wall.
Huo Yan sat quietly on the bed with his freshly wrapped hands resting on his knees.
His head remained lowered, his chin nearly touching his collarbone.
The loose end of the cloth strip peeked out between his fingers while his thumb rubbed slowly across it, once, then again.
The fabric still carried her warmth.
After cleaning up the glass, Shen Qingqing straightened and wiped the blood from her palms onto her pants before glancing back at him.
Huo Yan’s lips moved slightly, as though he wanted to say something, but the words never came out.
“Oh right, with your hand injured like this, the wounds can’t touch untreated water.”
Shen Qingqing walked over and crouched in front of him again, grabbing his hand without warning.
Huo Yan’s back slammed against the wall.
Shen Qingqing lowered her head and gently blew against the still-bleeding wound in his palm.
Huo Yan’s pupils exploded wide.
Within those gray, clouded eyes, the fog seemed to split open down the middle.
His heart skipped a beat as blood rushed violently back through his veins and slammed against his ribs with a deafening roar.
His hands were trembling.
Not from pain.