Chapter Seventy-Four – Answering One’s Own Questions

If there were something in this world colder than cold itself, it would be this room containing five people.

Yishu sat in her chair, her gaze fixed on the bowls of food on the table, indifferent and tasteless. Tears rolled disobediently from the corners of her eyes. Just a few drops, she tried her best to restrain the flood. Yet even these salty, bitter drops could gather into an ocean, and ironically, the first to drown was herself.

Yanlu paced back and forth in the room, hands on her hips, as if every step she took shrank the room by one square meter. With each stride, the atmosphere grew so stifling it was as though they were trapped in the midsummer Taklamakan Desert.

“Still not coming in?” Yanlu muttered. “He didn’t run away, did he?”

“Run away?” Yishu suddenly stood up, her knee banging into the underside of the table. The pitiful, forgotten dishes shook helplessly, voicing their abandonment. Yishu ignored the pain shooting through her knee, or the deeper wounds more agonizing than the ache, draining her energy.

“Are you all right?” Yanlu heard the collision and rushed to Yishu’s side in a flash. “He won’t leave, will he? My boyfriend and his are both outside.”

“He might run,” Yishu disagreed with Yanlu’s optimism and instead sided with her initial suspicion. When someone’s carefully hidden secret is suddenly exposed without warning, fleeing is the most instinctive reaction.

Yishu and Yanlu were at an impasse. Looking back, after all these years, their arguments always outnumbered harmony.

Before deciding to join Kaisheng, Yanlu had tried every excuse. Facing computer screens all day, the radiation-induced skin issues could not be compensated by any amount of money. A hot-tempered, straightforward person dealing with all sorts of monstrous clients, prematurely entering the ranks of the haggard and worn. For Yanlu, who cherished beauty above all, this was a devastating blow. Yet after Yishu’s persistent persuasion, she agreed to try it for a while. Unexpectedly, “a while” became five years. And over those five years, they both met their respective “him.”

Yanlu felt that Yishu’s stubbornness actually possessed a strange power to script the future. People stumble into fate by accident; seeking it deliberately is futile.

Just then, Xu Shixi entered with Su Yihui. He moved like a marionette, limbs stiff, knees and elbows unable to bend.

How should the conversation proceed? Somewhere, the fateful page in their story had been torn out.

“Yihui—come here,” Yishu lifted her head, unable to think of what to say. At least, call him over first and then decide.

Yihui took two steps, then stopped.

“Sis, I know what needs to be said, what needs to be asked.” He blinked slowly, the black outlines flickering across his retina.

“If you want to ask, just ask,” he said. Now that he’d been discovered, why not face judgment and punishment honestly? At least he would retain a shred of humanity.

“I won’t ask,” Yishu said, relieved. “I hope you tell me yourself. Let’s turn this interrogation into a self-explanatory speech.”

Su Yihui heard the pain and sorrow in Yishu’s words; her tone and manner had shifted abruptly.

Self-questioning would do just as well. Yihui’s lips twitched. Avoiding harsh questions, gently interrogating himself, like speaking softly to oneself, no need to worry about sharp looks or mocking laughter.

Su Yihui stared at the lush heart-leaf vine in the corner. Though spared the wind and rain outside, indoor plants grew delicate, but purely from an ornamental perspective, they had the greatest value.

“I really didn’t go to university. After leaving home that day, I went straight to Zhishu Café.” Yihui’s gaze lingered on the plant. “A third-rate university, a crowd of ninth-rate students, and an even lower-ranked me. In hindsight, giving up university five years ago was the right decision.”

Yihui vividly remembered, during a high school computer class, stumbling onto a blog post by an ordinary junior at university—a speck of dust in the crowd. The post recounted overhearing a senior on the phone to a freshman: “Teachers don’t care about students anymore. If I don’t manage you, who will?” Presumably, the freshman replied, “Senior, you’re so strict.” The senior continued, “I’m strict? I’m too lenient with you!” It sounded like concern, but as both observer and participant, it struck Yihui as deeply ironic. Just two years older, just two years more meals, just two years more life—nothing more. Yet in matters of life, still inexperienced. Only addicted to online games, unable to extricate themselves. Living nocturnally—was there any wisdom in that? Another roommate asked how the student got into university. “Independent admission,” came the answer. The reply: “Independent admission is getting worse.” Yihui felt it was laughable—wasn’t this the pot calling the kettle black? Reflecting on his own past, he found it absurd, ridiculous, pathetic. Back then, he’d been bossed around by these ignorant people, whose so-called recruitment only sought free labor for their own entertainment. Utterly absurd. They were blissfully unaware, as was he; now that he knew, he regretted it, but time never returns. Yet life continued its drama: “Year after year the flowers remain the same, but the people change.”

Yihui compared this with his two-plus years in high school; the similarity was astonishing. Having lifted his foot, suspended between advancing and retreating—perhaps stepping back was another kind of progress.

“Yes, I am a fool,” Yishu, stung by Yihui’s words, spoke incoherently. She had sacrificed for her brother’s life and studies, not because she saw through the essence of college and sought escape. Yishu forced a bitter smile; sometimes, the foolish things people do warrant only self-pity—others see it as a joke.

“What nonsense!” Yanlu banged the table. “Don’t you know your sister didn’t go to university not because she didn’t want to, but for you. Not wanting to study is one thing; you’re nineteen, an adult, with independent thoughts and judgment. No one can force you. But speak with conscience—did she not want to, or could she not? You make it easy, only judging the result, not the process, ignoring the reason.”

Yihui was taken aback; this wasn’t what he meant. He only wanted to say that college doesn’t determine most people’s lives—it wasn’t a denial of his sister’s devotion. But once spoken, his words twisted into another meaning, and regret followed.

Yishu watched as Yanlu expressed exactly what she herself wanted to say, with no room for addition.

She and her brother had never quarreled, and the absence of their parents had only drawn them closer.

“I only ask, what are your plans now?” Yishu asked solemnly. “Are you still considering university? The reporting deadline is a month overdue. I remember the admission notice said September twelfth. Today is October third—nine days left. Pack up, you can still make it.”

“Sis—” Yihui dragged out the last syllable. “I thought you understood me.”

If I wanted to go, wouldn’t I have gone?

Yishu closed her eyes in despair. Enough, she thought, enough. In the end, everyone must walk their own path. She’d laid the track for her brother at nineteen, and now she was spent.

“Perhaps his choice should be respected,” Xu Shixi said softly, fearing his words might deepen Yishu’s sorrow.

I want to respect his choice too, but I don’t want him to make a wrong one. A café waiter, spending ten years of youth, growing old in a dim kitchen—was that all?

Yishu didn’t want Yihui to embark on a predestined rocky path; whatever the alternative, it could not be worse than this.