Translator: Yuzu
“Brother, I may not be able to come out to play with you anymore.” The little boy was wearing a large hospital gown, which covered his small body. His little face was so pale, his neck so white that you could even see his veins, but despite this, he tried to smile and pretended to be cheerful. Still, he couldn’t hide the hint of loss in his eyes.
The boy stared into his eyes, didn’t say a word, and sat down on the stool. He put his hand on the other boy’s head and stroked his hair.
But it was impossible to ignore the fact that the back of his hand was full of needle marks. What was even more frightening was that the little finger of the boy’s right hand was broken! And it was obviously a fresh wound!
The boy’s eyes met the other’s; he narrowed his eyes, not knowing what he was thinking. Still, the little boy could feel the boy’s body visibly stiffen after he said his words. His breathing even stopped for a brief second, then became a little quicker.
The boy, who had always been silent, looked at him seriously and softly asked with a low voice, “Why?”
The little boy’s eyes dodged, avoiding the boy’s gaze. Then, he scratched his head and lowered it to look at the ground, not daring to meet the boy’s eye, “That, I’m sick, aren’t I? I’ll be in quarantine for treatment, and then if I’m well, I’ll just be discharged.”
After the little boy had spoken, the other boy didn’t talk. The little boy had gotten used to his silence, his heart was sad, and his eyes filled with tears.
He didn’t dare and couldn’t tell him the real reason.
The boy nodded his head, and his eyes went around the little boy’s back, looking at the big tree outside the window. Through the glass, he could clearly see that the branches and leaves of the tree had yellowed and even started to wilt.
The boy narrowed his eyes, his expression somewhat shifting. He raised his head and suddenly said to the little boy, “Autumn is coming.”
The little boy was confused.
I don’t like autumn.
–
Xiao Chen stared at the tree outside the window and looked to be in a trance for a moment before he suddenly reacted after being pushed by Zhou Ming beside him.
Xiao Chen returned to his senses and pointed at the tree outside the window, “Isn’t it summer now? Why is that tree all withered?”
Zhou Ming followed his gaze and casually said, “Who knows? They say it’s the school’s wishing tree. See the red ribbons hanging on the tree? It’s all hung by students, and the tree has been in the school for a long time, I think.”
Xiao Chen nodded.
Zhou Ming narrowed his eyes and was not sure of what he saw. Suddenly, he went up to pick up Xiao Chen’s collar. Xiao Chen was shocked and started to break free of his hand, but he was also teased twice.
“Damn, Xiao Chen, you even got a tattoo! I didn’t see it before! The pattern is pretty unique.” Zhou Ming smiled mischievously and touched him twice at the location of his shoulder blades. Xiao Chen mercilessly knocked him straight down with his hand, and with a low voice, he said, “Don’t touch.”
Zhou Ming chuckled, feeling good, and wanted to touch a couple more times, but before he could put it into practice, and he didn’t know how he suddenly felt a shiver for no reason. His heart started to panic as if something had taken control of his body. There was an unreal feeling of being suspended in the air. His hand that was stretched out in mid-air was stuck there.
At this time, Xiao Chen was still touching the back of his neck innocently and was in deep thought.
He actually couldn’t remember when he got this tattoo, as if he had it from the time he lost his memory.
And he didn’t have any memories from before he was ten.
But he had a gut feeling that he must have met someone important to him before he was ten years old.
Not only that, this tattoo was just like the pendant he had always hung around his neck. Even if he didn’t have a deep memory, he knew that it was incredibly precious to him.
Thinking of this, Xiao Chen subconsciously clutched the pendant.
It was as important as his life. No one could touch it!
“You’re back?” Low and gloomy, someone was talking.
Xiao Chen became a little stiff, and his lips began to turn pale.
He heard the voice again.
Zhou Ming finally calmed down and covered his heart, gasping for breath as if he had been dreaming. He was now panicking at the sight of Xiao Chen’s face; he stammered, “Xiao, Xiao Chen, I’m going to use the bathroom first. You don’t need to worry about me, you can go first.”
Before Xiao Chen could reply, Zhou Ming hurriedly ran away.
Xiao Chen pursed his lips and shook his head, and the voice disappeared.
His gaze couldn’t help but drop onto the large, yellow tree outside the window.
This tree was strange; it felt out of place in the world when it stood there. Even though its trunk was withered and yellow, it had a robust and sturdy feel to it. It was incredibly strange when it was accompanied by other large green trees.
–
“Can you hear the trees?” The boy sat in his chair, looking out through the window at the big trees, and suddenly spoke out.
“Can trees talk too?” The little boy was confused.
The boy’s expression remained the same, the corners of his mouth slightly upturned, but for some reason, there was a sense of irony to it, “Of course.”
“What would it say?” The little boy was confused.
The boy didn’t answer, just stroked the other’s hair, smiled, and said softly, “Maybe one day, you’ll be able to hear.”
–
Xiao Chen covered his head as some more incomplete and trivial images flashed through his head. He saw two boys.
Very familiar.
Xiao Chen felt like he had a headache.
But before Xiao Chen could think about it, his eyes were drawn to something else. He noticed that it was Li Da’s ex-girlfriend, which Zhou Ming mentioned yesterday, appeared downstairs.
Of course, there was no way that Xiao Chen noticed her without reason.
The girl’s state looked a bit strange.
This was Xiao Chen’s first impression.
Xiao Chen, who was now standing on the library’s second floor by the window, was a bit confused and stood up, leaning against the window to watch the person’s strange behavior.
The girl looked even uglier than yesterday’s state. Her hair was unkempt and even a little oily. She was still wearing the same school uniform, and from a great distance, he could see that her face was a bit waxy, giving him the illusion that she had aged more than ten years overnight.
No, maybe it wasn’t an illusion.
Xiao Chen fixed his eyes.
Around the girl, anyone who passed by her couldn’t help but look at her with an expression that contained a bit of horror and even disgust that couldn’t be concealed.
The girl lowered her head down. Compared to yesterday’s state, she seemed to be more cowering, even subconsciously covering her face, as if she didn’t want to be seen.
There weren’t many people on this side of the library, and few people passed by. After the girl was sure that everyone was gone, she looked around with wide eyes before withdrawing her gaze.
Next, Xiao Chen saw a scene that made him baffled.
This girl was just like a spider. She used both her hands and legs together, her limbs attached to the tree trunk, and then gently climbed up. The whole process was swift and quick, the total time did not add up to more than half a minute, and then her entire body was blocked by the withered tree branches.
Xiao Chen concentrated on the scene in front of him, his Adam’s apple moved, and he did not know how long it took before the girl jumped down from the trunk.
But once again, Xiao Chen’s eyes widened.
For whatever reason, the girl’s originally waxy and yellow face became fair again. Even the condition was many times better than what he saw yesterday.
There was a vivid image of returning from being an older woman to being a young girl.
The girl quickly fled the scene, not even noticing that someone was standing at the second-floor window staring at her the whole time.
Xiao Chen was horrified and covered his nose and mouth, his body becoming stiff.
“What’s the matter? The whole day has been soul-crushing!” Zhou Ming recovered as he happily played with his game console. He looked at Xiao Chen’s face with his peripheral view.
Xiao Chen came back to his senses. He thought about the girl he saw today and hesitantly asked, “That ex-girlfriend of Da Zi we saw yesterday, what’s her name?”
Zhou Ming’s hand holding the game console shook and almost fell to the ground. He did not have time to care about the “game over” words on the screen. He looked at Xiao Chen, “Wait a minute! You don’t have a crush on her, do you?”
Not waiting for Xiao Chen’s answer, Zhou Ming continued, “I can tell you, I’m not going to say anything like friend’s wife can’t be bullied, this kind of bullshit. I promise I won’t say a word if you look at Da Zi’s other ex-girlfriends, but I’m telling you! Just her! Absolutely not!”
Xiao Chen tried to open his mouth to explain, but Zhou Ming continued like a bazooka, “You were concentrating on preparing for the 8th Grade English Exam during that time, so you didn’t know! But the whole school pretty much knows about it! Didn’t she break up with Da Zi? And then knelt in front of Da Zi and begged to be reunited. That’s not all. You have no idea what kind of drama followed!”
Zhou Ming swallowed, “She set up a relationship with Da Zi to keep him, and even got pregnant, thinking that Li Da wouldn’t abandon her! This girl is too stupid! The whole school knows about the incident! Her parents even made a scene at school! They dragged her by her hair and took her to have an abortion.”
Xiao Chen blinked and frowned.
He was aware that Li Da was very unscrupulous. Their relationship was just so-so, there wasn’t much interaction between them. Still, they were roommates and had feelings for each other, after all. And in the whole school, he was also the one who had the best relationship with Zhou Ming. Of course, this might be related to Zhou Ming’s grinning personality.
Zhou Ming sighed, “But I heard that this girl’s grades are very good, and she’s going to be admitted to graduate school. Otherwise, she would have been expelled after this big thing happened. This is all because the school is reluctant to let go of such a good seedling.”
Xiao Chen nodded his head in understanding.
When Zhou Ming saw him looking calm, he couldn’t help but frown, “I’ve said so much, do you understand? You mustn’t touch this girl!”
Xiao Chen glanced at him, “I don’t like her.”
Zhou Ming stared at Xiao Chen for two seconds. There was no doubt about it, and he let out a sigh of relief, “You should have said so! Then why did you ask her name for? I’ll have to think about it! Wait a minute, let me think of her name. Oh! Yes, yes, yes! Her name is Wang Jingyi!”
Xiao Chen nodded and didn’t speak again.
——If there really was a shop in this world where you could pawn anything, what would you pawn? And what would you want?
——Remember, here, you can only pawn, not redeem.
——Unless, of course, you’re willing to use something new to pawn back what you already have.