Three days later, at Yongchuan Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine.
Shao Wu lay in a private hospital room with his eyes closed, only to open them again after a short while. He was bored. On a Monday afternoon, even the usually busy hospital was quiet, and the room’s window was half-covered by dark green ivy, so from where Shao Wu lay, he could not see anything outside.
Shao Wu thought that at least it was a private room. Otherwise, if another patient asked him, “Hey, what happened to you? You look so mild-mannered. What, did you get into a fight with someone?” how was he supposed to answer?
“I got beaten. An ashtray hit the back of my head. It hurt like hell. Took seven stitches.”
…No. Too embarrassing.
“Power struggle among the school leadership. I took a minor injury. Nothing serious.”
…No. Too unhinged.
“A gentleman can wait ten years to avenge a wrong. They used to bully my brother, so what did they expect?”
…No. Nobody would believe that.
And he did not want anyone to know that he had done all this for Yang Shuyi.
That morning he had gone back to school to hand over his work and ran into one of the teachers who had started at the same time as him. The man looked at him with a smile, arms folded, wearing the expression of someone who had nothing to do with any of it. “Shao Wu, you’re really something. The whole school knows what you did now.”
Shao Wu said, “Oh, really?”
“Well, what can I say? You top students are just proud. Can’t take the slightest grievance… How could a dump like our school possibly be good enough for you?”
Shao Wu knew the man was mocking him and could not be bothered to waste words. “Mm. It really isn’t good enough.”
With that, he turned and walked away.
Unfortunately, he had barely taken a few steps when he ran straight into Director Wang. After only a few days apart, Director Wang’s round beer belly seemed to have shrunk noticeably.
And then Director Wang hit Shao Wu with an ashtray, and Shao Wu had the misfortune of ending up in the hospital.
Still, this private room had been personally arranged by a leader from the Education Commission. The leadership was obviously more nervous about the situation than Shao Wu himself. Vice Principal Gao’s academic misconduct had already become common knowledge; if something happened to the whistleblower at a moment like this, the problem would become much more serious.
The official held Shao Wu’s hand and repeatedly urged him, “Teacher Shao, you have to take care of yourself. We’ve already spoken to the hospital. Wherever you feel uncomfortable, have it checked. Don’t worry, Teacher Shao, we’ve already verified what you reported. The education sector needs upright, selfless people like you…”
Shao Wu agreed again and again, feeling a little guilty. Everyone thought he was a fearless young newcomer who could not stand Principal Gao’s academic fraud and had risen up to report him.
Only Shao Wu himself knew that was not true.
At least, that was not the main reason.
The main reason, of course, was what had happened six years ago.
Fortunately, that was something only he cared about. Nobody could possibly guess.
Shao Wu stretched his left leg. His wound was on the right side of his head, so he could only lie on his left, and his left leg had been pinned underneath him for too long and felt uncomfortable. Worse still, the painkiller seemed to be wearing off. He could clearly feel the pain from the wound, fine threads of it boring straight into his skull.
The air conditioner was set to twenty-five degrees, yet a layer of cold sweat still seeped across his back.
He did not feel like looking at his phone, and he could not focus on a magazine, so Shao Wu could only close his eyes and let his mind wander. He thought he had done more daydreaming in this one noon than in all his years at school. Yang Shuyi was away on a business trip in Aba, on the western Sichuan plateau. Presumably it was the sort of place where the wind bent the grass and revealed cattle and sheep… But why would people from the Chengdu Geological Exploration Bureau be sent to Aba? Poverty-alleviation work? It was the rainy season, and most of the roads there were in the mountains. Come to think of it, that did not sound especially safe…
Elio’s Notes: The phrase about the wind bending the grass to reveal cattle and sheep echoes the famous Northern Dynasties folk song Song of the Chile (《敕勒歌》), an image strongly associated with vast northern grasslands.
Forget Yang Shuyi. He should think about himself. His father was in Chongqing for meetings that week, while his mother had gone traveling around Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand with the kindergarten teachers. At the moment, neither of them knew that he had staged this spectacular act of hurting the enemy at great cost to himself in Yongchuan… But afterward? How was he supposed to explain it?
His parents had reminded him again and again before: You’re working now. You can’t keep being so willful.
This counted as being willful again, didn’t it?
Actually, “willful” sounded better than “stupid,” though Shao Wu did not think he was being stupid either.
The sound of high heels came from the corridor, tap-tap-tap, moving quickly. A few seconds later, the door to the room was pushed open.
Sister Shan hurried in with red-rimmed eyes.
“Hey.” Shao Wu gave her a smile. “Didn’t I tell you there was no need to visit? This private room is great.”
“Shao Wu.” The moment Sister Shan saw him, her voice choked again. “Are you stupid?”
…He had literally just decided he did not think he was being stupid.
“Sis, I’m fine.” Shao Wu tried to make his voice sound vigorous. “It’s just a little cut, really. If you don’t believe me, look… Oh, it’s covered in gauze, so you can’t see it. I’m really fine. Wang Shougang, that dumbass, is already that old. How much strength could he possibly have?”
But the more he spoke, the faster Sister Shan’s tears fell.
“Sis, really, I’m fine.” Shao Wu kept smiling, his tone light. “The doctor said I just need to stay overnight for observation. I can be discharged tomorrow.”
Sister Shan yanked out a tissue and scrubbed hard at her face.
Then she said, “The Education Commission will announce the disciplinary decision tomorrow. Because the evidence you prepared was so complete, Gao Shenguo is being transferred to a township primary school and won’t be allowed to hold an administrative post anymore. Wang Shougang is being transferred to another school.”
“Oh,” Shao Wu said. “That’s not bad.” He had already been mentally prepared. Academic fraud was not a fatal stain for a middle-school teacher. If he had not ghostwritten three papers in one go for Gao Shenguo and then had Wang Shougang crack his head open, the punishment would probably have been even lighter.
Overall, he was satisfied with the result.
Sister Shan got up and closed the hospital-room door tightly. Then she sat back down beside Shao Wu’s bed and looked at him, her eyes glistening as though she were about to cry again.
“I think the disciplinary result is pretty good,” Shao Wu hurried to say. “I’m satisfied. Really.”
“You’re satisfied?”
“Mm.”
“You might be satisfied.” She paused for two seconds, then asked hoarsely, “Does Yang Shuyi know?”
The afternoon hospital room was so quiet that Shao Wu could hear his own breathing, slightly hurried.
“Sis.” He smiled again. “You figured it out?”
It made sense. Sister Shan had known about what happened back then too.
But suddenly, a bad feeling rose in his chest.
“Shao Wu… Shao Wu, do you know?” Sister Shan turned away, as though she could not bear to look at his face. “That afternoon after your gaokao ended, Yang Shuyi came to my office to get his watch.”
“…” Yes. He knew that.
Sister Shan’s shoulders trembled. “He got the watch, and then he asked me a question… At the time, I really, really didn’t think it was you. I knew the two of you were close, but I didn’t think it was you.”
“What did he ask?”
“He said one of his friends seemed to like him. He didn’t like that person back, but he didn’t want to lose the friendship either… He asked me what he should do.”
“…”
“I truly didn’t think it was you. I thought it was some girl in the class… I didn’t take it too seriously. You were both about to start university, and I thought that once you each had your own new lives, those feelings would slowly fade… So I told him to pretend he didn’t know.”
“…”
“I really never imagined it, Shao Wu. How could you be so stupid?” Sister Shan choked out. “You actually followed him to Chongqing.”
Shao Wu sat there stunned for a full minute, maybe two. In any case, for a stretch of time, he tried hard, repeatedly, through the pain, to understand what Sister Shan had just told him.
That afternoon. That distant afternoon.
So as early as… at least five years ago, Yang Shuyi had already known that Shao Wu liked him?
So when Shao Wu clutched his Chongqing University admission letter and said, “Now we can go to Chongqing together,” when he kept making flimsy excuses to visit Southwest University, when he watched Yang Shuyi give his phone number to a girl… Yang Shuyi had known all along that Shao Wu liked him.
Was that really how it had been?
Yang Shuyi had known for so, so long. That was why, when Shao Wu finally confessed, Yang Shuyi had lied using Zhu Jingjing as an excuse, because he had already known for years.
Maybe even before that, every time they met, Yang Shuyi had been waiting for Shao Wu to confess, so that once Shao Wu finally did, Yang Shuyi could reject him outright.
Was that really how it had been?
A wave of dizziness swept over Shao Wu. He sucked in a sharp breath, the sound like the startled wail of some animal.
Sister Shan hurriedly grabbed his shoulder. “What’s wrong?!”
“No, nothing…” Shao Wu could no longer make himself smile. “The wound hurts a little. The painkiller’s wearing off.”
“Then I’ll go get the doctor—”
“No. It hasn’t been six hours yet. When it’s time, I can take the medicine myself… Sister Shan, thank you.” Shao Wu spoke very slowly. “If you hadn’t told me, I never would’ve guessed… So he knew that early.”
“If after all these years he still can’t accept you, then please stop doing stupid things for him, okay?”
Shao Wu endured the grief, so strong it was impossible to describe, and said, “I’m not doing stupid things for him. At least not for who he is now… I know that sounds strange, but it’s true. I’m really not doing this for the person he is now.”
At last, he could no longer stop himself from defending his actions. “Yang Shuyi is doing fine now. He doesn’t need me standing up for him… I think I’m doing this for who he was before, for that Yang Shuyi from back then. Fan Pengfei bullied him. Because of Principal Gao, our homeroom teacher made him sit in that ‘special seat.’ His dad came to school and argued with our homeroom teacher… Back then, I couldn’t do anything. But I… I just kept thinking, why? Why did all of them get to bully Yang Shuyi?” What surprised Shao Wu was that even now, remembering it made his eyes sting. He did not know whether it was for Yang Shuyi or for himself. “Back then he had a fight with his dad. His dad was so angry he drove off to Yingxiu… and then May 12 happened, and he was gone. Sis, do you know? In the end, Yang Shuyi never got to make up with his dad. They were still angry with each other, and then his dad was just gone.”
“Why? Why did he have to be the one all this happened to…”
Shao Wu did not know whether Yang Shuyi had already made peace with those painful memories. He even felt that it no longer mattered. His resentment on Yang Shuyi’s behalf was his own affair. For the Yang Shuyi from that distant time, he wanted revenge. He wanted to throw an egg against a rock. That was his own affair.
“Shao Wu—”
At some point, the door to the hospital room had been pushed open.
Shao Wu looked up and saw Yang Shuyi standing in the doorway, wearing a lead-gray outdoor jacket.