Chapter 128: That Four-Leaf Clover Pendant Will Never Fall (1) |
He was back.
Really back.
Zhang Shutong stared blankly at the hospital room ceiling, thinking.
This regression—he'd inexplicably gone eight years into the future, then just as inexplicably returned.
But he had no time to ponder the reasons. The corridor outside had become noisy, and Zhang Shutong struggled to keep his mind clear. He looked again at the electronic calendar hanging on the wall.
Sunday morning, after the avalanche.
Four o'clock sharp.
The long-haired woman had already been taken away by Lu Qinglian.
He'd been brought to the hospital by Ruoping's father's car.
Why had he returned to this moment?
The regression ability could no longer be predicted by its usual patterns, but one thing remained constant—he would return to an "important node" before certain events occurred.
So where was this node?
Previously, he'd awakened on Monday and stayed at the off-island hospital for a week, but now he was a full day earlier.
What had he missed during that day?
Zhang Shutong anxiously tried to sit up, but the moment the thought arose, he discovered his body no longer obeyed him. All he could do was move his eyeballs. His arms were connected to various tubes, half his face covered by an oxygen mask, and machines sat at his bedside displaying incomprehensible waveforms.
Only then did he realize he was in the most vulnerable period, having just escaped danger not long ago. Wanting to do anything was pure fantasy. Unwilling to accept this, he lay in bed, trying to make a sound, but only hoarse, tuneless syllables emerged.
Fatigue, pain, drowsiness... He knew he could lose consciousness at any moment, so he stopped struggling, lying in bed and exhaling a turbid breath.
What exactly was that event?
Soon a doctor rushed over. He saw the other person take out a flashlight, then roughly pry open his eyelids. He instinctively tried to close his eyes, but the doctor firmly controlled his eyelids, then a beam of light shot into the depths of his eyes.
"Can you hear me talking? If you can, open your mouth?"
Zhang Shutong moved his lips.
Then the other person pressed on his upper eye socket—the pain made him furrow his brow—then lifted his hand... After a thorough examination that nearly knocked Zhang Shutong unconscious again, the doctor finally instructed the nurse behind him:
"Everything's normal. Finally out of danger. This kid is just too weak and needs rest. Don't let those classmates of his get close yet. Just notify the family."
"Okay."
The doctor left, and a nurse came to the bedside.
It was that young nurse.
The young nurse blinked: "Do you remember what your name is?"
"Zhang..."
"Good that you remember."
I wasn't finished... Zhang Shutong thought weakly. What if I'd said my name was Louis Koo?
He couldn't believe he still had the mood to crack a joke, but for Zhang Shutong, nothing was more joyful than returning from eight years in the future.
"Anything else you want to say?" The young nurse saw he still had his eyes open.
"Qingyi..."
"Who? Your classmate? That girl you brought back?"
The young nurse was a chatterbox. Asking didn't stop her from walking to the hospital room door:
"Who's Qingyi? Which classmate wants to see you?"
Zhang Shutong couldn't see the situation at the door clearly, and could only judge from the sounds that many people were there—Ruoping's, Gu Qiumian's, Qingyi's. Ruoping seemed to be holding up her phone on speaker, with an anxious woman's voice coming from inside.
All his thinking was now a beat slower. By the time he identified it as a call to his mom, a young man had already walked to the bedside.
The other person sighed and brought his ear close to his mouth:
"I'm listening."
"Gu... Qiumian."
"You want to see her?"
"Send her... back."
Qingyi thought for a moment:
"I get it—you mean send her back before her family notices?"
Zhang Shutong couldn't nod, and could only move his eyes.
"Anything else you need to tell me?"
"...Don't leave the island."
"You mean stay here?"
"Mm."
"What else?"
Zhang Shutong closed his eyes.
Qingyi seemed to close the door when he left.
This time the hospital room became completely quiet.
He pried his eyelids open again, looking at the ceiling, thinking about what else he hadn't managed to tell them.
But racking his brain, Zhang Shutong could only think of these two things. Since it was four in the morning, that meant Gu Qiumian hadn't called her dad yet, the people at the villa hadn't gotten up, and then there was not leaving the island—even if he couldn't move in the hospital, he had to ensure he stayed on the island.
Zhang Shutong intended to wait for Qingyi's reply. The reason he'd sought him out first was because Ruoping and Gu Qiumian could sometimes be a bit emotional.
He actually wanted to ask his mom more, but separated by phone, they might not communicate clearly.
These two matters were both difficult and simple. Zhang Shutong forced himself to stay awake, but his eyelids still closed bit by bit.
His consciousness returned to blankness.
...
The pitch-black snowy night.
Zhang Shutong returned to that mountain road.
He twisted the throttle and plunged straight into the road, but the avalanche didn't happen as expected.
Instead, he and the motorcycle crashed to the ground.
The long-haired woman approached step by step.
But worse was that the motorcycle had pinned him down. He tried to break free, but the motorcycle was so heavy, so heavy—no matter what, he couldn't push it off. Gradually he began to have trouble breathing.
Damn it, damn it, damn it!
He used all his strength but still couldn't push the motorcycle off.
Finally, the long-haired woman walked to his front.
Zhang Shutong woke with a start.
He gasped for air, and the first thing that entered his vision was an unfamiliar ceiling.
For an instant he felt disoriented.
Where was this?
The hospital?
Right, he'd returned from eight years in the future, given some instructions after falling unconscious again, and now he was safe.
This thought made his whole body relax.
A ray of sunlight mischievously slipped into his eyes.
He seemed to finally bid farewell to that snowy night. His senses began to clear, and everything was quiet. He smelled the disinfectant in the hospital room, finding within it a trace of familiar scent.
Zhang Shutong caught the smell from Gu Qiumian's body.
He was someone dull to scents, unable to distinguish whether so-called body fragrance was perfume, body wash, or body lotion, but he'd somehow memorized what Gu Qiumian's scent was like.
If sunlight had a smell, her scent was the warm yet moist breath of sunlight after rain—it could be very vague, who knew what sunlight smelled like, nothing but the scent of dead dust mites, but it could also be very specific: soil, plants, dust—they all had their unique fragrance after rain.
Zhang Shutong raised his head. On the clean striped sheets, Gu Qiumian lay sprawled at the bedside.
This was daytime. She seemed to be asleep, her eyelashes trembling with her breathing, the amplitude very light. Outside the window were trees, and when wind blew over, the branches swayed, sunlight penetrating through the gaps in the trees, dancing on her hair.
A four-leaf clover pendant hung from her hair.
Zhang Shutong also understood where that motorcycle pinning him down had come from.
It wasn't a motorcycle at all—it was actually Gu Qiumian.
Zhang Shutong moved his fingers, wanting to push Gu Qiumian's head away, but he couldn't. His left arm was in a brace—oh right, he remembered now, it was fractured.
Could it be that he didn't die from the avalanche but was crushed to death by Gu Qiumian herself? That would be pretty tragic.
He suddenly sighed, thinking: you really don't let me rest easy—even my nightmares are because of you.
Zhang Shutong didn't wake her. He looked at the electronic calendar:
December 9, Sunday.
1:20 PM.
This was Sunday afternoon.
Zhang Shutong breathed a sigh of relief and once again closed his eyes deeply.
The third time he woke, his mom woke him.
The sunlight wasn't as brilliant as at noon.
Gu Qiumian was also gone.
The time had reached the afternoon.
When his mom saw him, her eyes were a bit red. She said it was all her fault for leaving him alone and going off-island to have fun. Zhang Shutong said it's fine, Mom, look, I'm okay.
He lifted his hand, discovering he wasn't very convincing.
His mom was very distressed. In the end it was his dad who pulled her away, ruffling his hair: "Get well soon."
That afternoon Zhang Shutong saw many people.
You truly feel that you're sick—not because of how uncomfortable your body is, but because so many people come to visit.
His close friends came together to see him. First he saw Ruoping.
"We should never have gone along with your antics." Ruoping felt terrible. "Yesterday we should have just let you stay properly in the hospital instead of harming you."
He said don't worry, this time I'll take my medicine properly and follow the doctor's orders.
The doctor said his current condition wasn't suitable for being disturbed, so each person didn't talk much.
Du Kang was second. He said: "How'd you go down too, man? Next time don't go alone—if something comes up, call us."
Zhang Shutong said I know, next time if something comes up I'll try to call you guys for help.
"Actually, outside the second ring really isn't a good place." Zhang Shutong said after a while.
"What do you mean?"
"But the rooftop's not bad either—blowing in the wind, drinking beer. Maybe we'll have a chance in the future."
Du Kang muttered "Oh no, Shutong's gotten dumb from sleeping" and left.
The last one was Qingyi.
Zhang Shutong earnestly said if there's a suitable girl, hurry up and win her over, don't agonize over Kamen Rider and Ultraman.
"This kind of thing isn't for you to teach me, Shutong." Qingyi sighed and sat beside the bed.
"I just thought of something—Gu Qiumian didn't go back? How was she still here in the afternoon?"
"Oh, that's a long story. It was also Ruoping's dad who drove us. I went along. She called the housekeeper, the bodyguard was asleep in the car, so she got home very smoothly. That was in the morning, I think. Then she told her family a classmate was hospitalized and she wanted to visit. At that time Ruoping and I had stayed all morning and couldn't hold on anymore, so we went home to sleep first. Gu Qiumian stayed through the afternoon. You didn't wake up, so she went back, saying she'd come again in the afternoon. That's about it."
"Thanks."
"No need to thank me. I actually didn't do much, and I didn't act as a mediator in between. Actually I thought it would be very tricky, but when I left the hospital room and said Shutong has something to tell you, she very seriously asked me what she could do. I said Shutong wants you to go back, so she went back. Actually you think of her as too impulsive."
Zhang Shutong nodded, then said: "Sorry about breaking your motorcycle."
"It's not actually broken, just the rearview mirror shattered."
"Pretty tough."
"You're pretty tough too." Qingyi paused. "You're probably going to become a cautionary tale."
"What do you mean?"
"Riding a motorcycle out in the middle of the night to play around, then getting buried by snow—you'll probably become an example in this year's winter break safety handbook. 'A certain Zhang from such-and-such class did such-and-such thing,' like that."
"Whatever. At least I'm definitely not writing any reflection essay." Zhang Shutong was getting a bit tired.
Qingyi peeled an orange: "But you actually encountered something terrifying, right?"
Hey hey, big brother, is chunibyo really this omniscient?
"I looked at the motorcycle's rearview mirror. It wasn't from a crash—more like it was... hit by a person." Qingyi ate the orange, looking thoughtful. "And it's not just the motorcycle. You passed out near the villa, but you rode there from somewhere else—the traces along that route, another person's footprints, the mirror shards being far from where the avalanche occurred. Shutong, don't think you're hiding it so well."
"You know everything?"
"Correction—it's we." Qingyi said. "I know, Ruoping knows, Du Kang knows, Uncle and Auntie know, Gu Qiumian knows, and even her dad knows. You can't be an unknown hero this time."