“Sis.” Ji Qingyou cut her off. She met her gaze silently for a few seconds, her lashes trembling slightly. “I don’t want any unforeseen circumstances.”
Qin Shuangchi was silent.
After a long moment, Ji Qingyou’s phone rang, breaking the quiet.
She answered it, stood up, and explained, “A patient’s wound opened up. I need to go handle it.”
Before walking out of Qin Shuangchi’s office,
She heard Qin Shuangchi ask from behind her, her voice inexplicably tinged with hesitation. “Little You, do you think I shouldn’t marry Yu Muzhou?”
Ji Qingyou’s steps faltered.
She turned around in the quiet hallway, looking at Qin Shuangchi, who suddenly seemed a bit lonely in the office. After a while, she said softly,
“If Yu Muzhou is a good partner, I don’t object to your marriage. I won’t hold unnecessary prejudice against him because of what happened in the previous generation.”
“I believe Yu Qinjiu feels the same way. She has never blamed you. She just finds it hard not to feel pain when she sees Yu Muzhou.”
Before closing the door, she added another sentence.
“Besides, you and Yu Muzhou have known each other and accompanied each other for longer… than Yu Qinjiu and I have.”
I couldn’t possibly be so selfish as to separate you and Yu Muzhou, who have spent nearly thirty years together—childhood, adolescence, early adulthood—who have been in love for over a decade and are about to get married… just to preserve this close relationship Yu Qinjiu and I have.
~ ~ ~
She didn’t finish her lunch.
Ji Qingyou rushed to the ward to handle the patient whose wound had opened. She happened to run into Ji Xiruan, who was also in the same ward.
When she got there,
Ji Xiruan was already treating the patient, who had just had an appendectomy. Ji Xiruan was coaxing her. “It won’t hurt, it won’t hurt. Almost done. I’m really fast…”
The young woman lying in the bed was frowning, clutching the corner of her blanket, her face scrunched up in pain. “Doctor, be gentle. Ow! What is this stuff? It hurts so much…”
“Almost done, just hang on…” Ji Xiruan looked up at the woman. “I remember your dad had a motorcycle accident and came to the ER for stitches. He didn’t even blink.”
“My dad is my dad. I’m me.” The woman said. She stealthily opened one eye and saw Ji Qingyou standing by the bed. Her eyes lit up. “Dr. Ji, you’re here? Why don’t you do it? I feel like you’d be gentler.”
“No way. I finally got a chance.” Before Ji Qingyou could speak, Ji Xiruan cut in. “Your dad curses me out all the time. It’s only fair I get payback from his daughter.”
Ji Qingyou knew she was talking nonsense. She shot her a glance. “I think Dr. Ding likes you quite a bit.”
“Really? I don’t remember that.” Ji Xiruan squinted, joking. Then she looked at the girl on the bed, who was now looking suspicious. “This wound might need a few more stitches…”
“Ding Panpan!”
Before she could finish, there was a girl’s voice crying from outside the ward. Following the sound, a girl with twin tails, about the same age as Ding Panpan, ran in, her eyes red. She squeezed past Ji Qingyou with a grievance. But when she saw Ding Panpan’s wound, she stopped abruptly, some distance away. She nervously reached out a finger, the tears brimming in her eyes falling. Her voice was broken.
“I just got back from grandma’s house… when I heard… you were in the hospital?”
Hearing the phrase “grandma’s house,” Ji Qingyou’s gaze fell on the girl with twin tails. She lingered for a moment, as if carried by the wind blowing through the ward, back ten years ago.
But she quickly looked away, meeting Ji Xiruan’s gaze.
Even through the mask, Ji Qingyou could see Ji Xiruan’s eyes crinkling with laughter, almost completely shut, barely visible.
Ding Panpan, who had been moaning in pain just a moment ago, was so startled she forgot her own pain. “Ruan Zaining, how did you get here? I told my dad not to tell you.”
“And you!” The girl called Ruan Zaining wiped her tears. The red around her eyes became more pronounced. “You even told Uncle not to tell my mom. You’ve gotten so brave!”
“Oh, it was just a minor surgery.” Ding Panpan tried to comfort her, as if her wound had magically disappeared. Her curved eyes were lively and natural. “Look, the doctor is treating me. It’s almost done. It doesn’t hurt at all.”
“Really?” Ruan Zaining asked Ji Xiruan.
Ji Xiruan glanced at Ding Panpan, laughed for a moment, then said airily. “It doesn’t hurt, does it? But her wound needs two more stitches.”
As she spoke, she raised an eyebrow at Ding Panpan.
Ding Panpan’s smile froze. She turned to Ji Qingyou. “Really, Dr. Ji? Tell me the truth. Is this beautiful, female doctor lady getting back at me for my dad?”
And even in this situation, she had to add “beautiful, female doctor lady.”
Following her words, Ruan Zaining’s tear-filled gaze also turned to Ji Qingyou.
Ji Qingyou looked at them. Her eyes landed on the wound. Her fingers inside her pocket moved slightly. But her face was expressionless as she nodded. “Two more stitches would be better…”
Ding Panpan’s expression froze.
Ji Xiruan waved her hand. “I told you, but you wouldn’t believe me.”
Ruan Zaining looked at Ding Panpan’s wound with worry. Then she looked at Ji Qingyou. “Will they use anesthetic?”
“No.” Ji Xiruan answered directly. She had already picked up her tools. “Just two stitches. No need for anesthetic.”
Both Ruan Zaining and Ding Panpan’s faces fell. They looked like two panda cubs Ji Qingyou and Yu Qinjiu had seen on their trip to Chengdu, who couldn’t reach their bamboo.
Ji Qingyou, at an inopportune time, thought of this comparison. Coming back to her senses, she saw Ding Panpan grimacing at her. She added, “But it won’t hurt much. It’ll be over quickly.”
Ji Xiruan languidly looked up at Ji Qingyou. She was a bit puzzled by this unexpectedly comforting remark. She looked at Ruan Zaining, who was now standing next to Ding Panpan. Their hands were already clasped together.
Ji Xiruan’s eyes brightened with understanding. As she prepared to suture, she asked offhandedly, “You two seem really close. Have you known each other long?”
“Yeah!” Ruan Zaining tightened her grip on Ding Panpan’s hand, pursing her lips tightly, watching Ji Xiruan’s actions closely. “We’ve known each other since we were little. We’re very, very, very good friends.”
She used three “very”s to describe their friendship.
Ding Panpan still wasn’t satisfied. She shook their joined hands. “The best friends in the world—”
She was cut off midsentence.
“Oh—” Ji Xiruan had already begun to suture, casually diverting Ding Panpan’s attention. “No wonder you’re so close. So you’re the best friends in the world. Do you ever fight?”
“Not often. But sometimes we do over little things…” Ruan Zaining’s eyes brimmed with tears again. She watched Ji Xiruan’s suturing closely, but still tried to distract Ding Panpan.
“But if she makes me mad, she always apologizes first and gives me a puppy plush. If I make her mad, I give her a kitten plush…”
“Wow! You must have a lot of plushies by now!” a patient who had been watching the commotion chimed in.
Ruan Zaining shook her head, the tears in her eyes swaying.
“No. We rarely make each other mad.”
The feelings of youth are always so sincere.
Especially when Ruan Zaining said these things while tightly holding Ding Panpan’s hand. It was a gesture of passing strength, something that only existed in such incredibly close relationships.
Ji Qingyou stared at their intertwined hands for a long time.
Then she looked away.
During the entire procedure, she kept both hands in her pockets. It wasn’t until Ji Xiruan was completely finished that she stepped forward to check on Ding Panpan’s condition and gave her some instructions, telling her to be careful and not to move too much.
After she finished, noticing Ruan Zaining’s anxious look, she slightly lifted the corner of her mouth, offering a comforting smile.
“Don’t worry. She won’t be in much pain.”
It was a very ordinary sentence. But it wasn’t Ji Qingyou’s usual tone. She even smiled slightly when she said it. She explained it was just courtesy. But it still caught Ji Xiruan’s attention. She kept looking at her until they went to the cafeteria for lunch and then back to the office.
Ji Xiruan was still staring at her, her eyes bright.
She sat down, and Ji Xiruan dragged her office chair over, tapping her computer screen. “Hey, I bet you’re thinking about Miss Alps, aren’t you?”
“Seeing a childhood sweetheart made you think of your own childhood sweetheart?”
Through their daily interactions, Ji Xiruan knew that Miss Alps was an old friend, a childhood friend Ji Qingyou had known since she was five.
Usually, Ji Qingyou would push her away or simply deny it.
But this time, unexpectedly,
Ji Qingyou lowered her eyes and hummed in agreement.
Her voice was so faint that Ji Xiruan thought she had misheard. But when she pressed her for more, Ji Qingyou didn’t give any further answer. She just shot her a cold glance.
Ji Xiruan knew she hadn’t misheard. She tried to pry more out of her, but she got a call and had to leave the office.
The office had a few scattered people. The conversation continued.
But Ji Qingyou’s thoughts had drifted away.
She seemed to be back in that deliberately forgotten time.
After a long while, as the clock hand on the wall turned to 5, her fingers tapped on the desk. She paused for a second, then hesitantly opened the bottom right drawer.
Inside was a transparent jar.
It held a few scattered origami cranes. Only two colors: blue and green. Seven in total. Three blue, four green.
She placed the jar on the desk and stared at it for a while.
For a moment, she was pulled back into that room with a rainbow. The sunlight was abundant. The rainbow swayed at the edge of the sky. A young Yu Qinjiu curved her eyes, her voice soft as she whispered in her ear.
“Ji Qingyou, let’s not say sorry to each other anymore.”
“If you make me mad, fold me a blue origami crane as an apology. If I make you mad, I’ll fold you a green one…”
As she spoke, she lowered her head and lightly tossed a folded green crane into the glass jar. When she looked up, her crescent-shaped eyes curved. “This one is on me.”
Finally, she emphasized.
“Anyway, don’t say the words ‘I’m sorry’ so easily anymore.”
Back then, Yu Qinjiu’s mind was full of strange ideas. Ji Qingyou didn’t know how she came up with using origami cranes as apologies.
But that was probably Yu Qinjiu for you.
Resourceful, unforgettable Yu Qinjiu.
Ji Qingyou didn’t object. She thought this method seemed to suit their friendship. The jar for the origami cranes was kept by her. But up to now, the blue and green cranes combined hadn’t filled the jar.
The number of times they had been truly angry at each other wasn’t many.
The worst time, neither had said sorry.
Ji Qingyou sat quietly, her fingers rubbing the watch on her wrist. After a long moment, she took a piece of paper from the drawer. As she put the jar of cranes back into the drawer,
The blue origami cranes inside had become four.
