Fu Tingli had a long and intricate dream.
In one part, she was still in California, limping out of the hospital covered in wounds. The woman was wearing her oversized T-shirt and riding a motorcycle. She tossed a helmet to Fu Tingli, who put it on and climbed onto the high seat behind her, wrapping her arms around the woman’s waist.
They truly became a pair of outlaw lovers, traveling the world before returning to Shanghai in their thirties, fully settled down with each other.
Fu Tingli opened a quiet little sculpture workshop where she could work freely, still as young and innocent as ever, only doing what she pleased—even if it all burned to pale ashes, it wouldn’t scorch that bold, youthful heart. The woman became a household name as an actress, winning an award for every film, still as passionate and free-spirited as she had been in California. She loved those cheap red wine burst-bead cigarettes and would pin Fu Tingli down for a fierce, unapologetic kiss just like before.
At first, their love was hidden away, but later it blazed openly and without a backward glance. They ignored the online floods of abuse and gossip, the whole world’s homophobia—living like protagonists in a movie, as long as they savored every moment.
At night, they would cruise around in that vintage old car. The woman would get a call saying she’d been replaced in her next film. In time, they broke up and got back together repeatedly, their love growing more toxic for reasons Fu Tingli couldn’t pinpoint. Finally, they parted on an open highway. She grabbed a rock and smashed it against the car in a frenzy, then collapsed in the middle of the road, head split open and bleeding, declaring that the world was too small to hold even one pair of lovers.
In another part of the dream, her family had gone bankrupt, her mother was drowning in debt, and she was living on a rundown old street when she met a woman in a green plaid shirt and canvas shoes.
The woman drove a truck, smoking a crumpled cigarette, her long hair loosely tied back in a weary, windswept style.
The truck rattled past, and the woman glanced back at her. Fu Tingli called out to her smilingly as “Ayang,” then climbed aboard. They sped down deserted highways toward one snowfall after another.
They made love squeezed into the narrow front seat of the truck. In the end, Ayang died in a blizzard, and Fu Tingli lay in the snow for a long time, watching the heavy white flakes drift down onto her face.
She thought to herself that the world was so vast, yet it couldn’t accommodate even one pair of lovers.
Fu Tingli’s eyes snapped open, her heart pounding like a drum. The tangled, chaotic stories had swept through her mind like a tornado, leaving everything in disarray.
The dreams felt utterly real, yet both ended badly, leaving her short of breath when she woke, her vision blurry.
In a daze, she stared at the flickering plain white bulb overhead, locked in a staring contest with its dimming light.
She realized that before her lay neither a sunlit open highway nor thick snow closing in from all sides.
The harsh white light blurred into double images before her eyes, and she gazed at it in a stupor for a moment.
She wondered why neither dream had a happy ending. And if she had to choose one path to follow to the end, which would it be?
“Yo? Awake?”
A bright, unfamiliar woman’s voice cut through the air beside her ear, popping all those muddled questions.
Fu Tingli turned her head slightly and vaguely made out a hazy white figure standing by the bed.
The next second, pain exploded through her—everywhere.
It was a dense, intricate ache, like insidious flames licking through her bones, numbing her entire spine.
“Pain,” she said, only to find her lips cracked and dry as parched earth.
“Pain? Of course it hurts—you’ve got frostbite. Out in that freezing snow, subzero temps, and you ditched your coat to carry a feverish patient two kilometers? You really dragged her out—a bona fide Good Samaritan.”
The woman’s voice carried a teasing lilt, drifting from beside the bed in fits and starts. Amid it came the clinking and clanging of equipment.
Fu Tingli’s throat felt scorched. She fixed her gaze on the swinging ID badge clipped to the faded white coat. The double image slowly sharpened, her mind steadying as it focused on the solid characters: Mu Chixue. It looked like a doctor’s badge.
The two disjointed dreams faded into the distance and shattered as those three clear characters came into view.
She felt so confused.
She and Kong Liyuan had never been outlaw lovers roaring around on a motorcycle.
And there was no Ayang in this world.
Now, there was only her—holed up on a rundown old street, sunk in defeat—and Kong Liyuan, who had become an actress.
She was just a lowly crew hand on set, hanging around for a few days and sharing a stretch of road with the lead actress. How had she gotten so swept up in the role?
Why dream such bizarre and vivid fantasies? Why spout all that nonsense about lovers in her sleep?
“Where is she?” Fu Tingli struggled to ask.
“Who? Oh, got it—the one you carried in. She’s fine.”
The woman doctor picked up her words at once, pressing a hand to Fu Tingli’s shoulder and firmly pushing her back down as she tried to sit up.
“Hey, you’ve got an IV! Don’t move!”
Fu Tingli sank back, and the overwhelming pain surged again, clinging to her skin and seeping into her bones.
She stared at the glaring white light, thinking there was really no need to worry. Since the woman was fine, her manager’s team must have come and whisked her away. Better than rotting here with her in this rundown aid station.
She pressed her lips together, unable to picture Kong Liyuan lying there as bedraggled and dejected as she was. She had no idea if the woman’s fever had broken.
Earlier, while the doctor examined her—asking where it hurt, where it didn’t—Fu Tingli had answered while taking stock of her surroundings.
This didn’t look like a hospital. The facilities were basic: a cramped white space with a messy table, a glass cabinet stuffed with medicines, and a few makeshift beds surrounded by curtained frames.
Now the curtains were all pulled back. Aside from her, the other beds held several people bundled up tight, drowsily hooked to IVs.
It had to be some village or town aid station.
“So when can I leave?”
Ignoring the dull ache in her chest, she rasped the question through her sore throat.
“Leave? Go where?”
Doctor Mu glanced down at her, then unhooked the empty IV bag from the stand above and replaced it with a full one.
Fu Tingli blinked, not grasping what Doctor Mu meant.
“If you mean leaving here, you can go once this bag’s done.”
Doctor Mu replied briskly, then yanked the thin red-and-yellow curtain around Fu Tingli’s bed halfway across, screening her off from the neighboring beds.
Fu Tingli could barely muster the energy to lift her eyelids. She eyed the full IV bag that had just gone up; even the liquid sloshing inside made her dizzy.
Before she could close her eyes again, she heard the swish of curtains nearby.
She looked over, drawn by the sound.
Doctor Mu had pulled open the tightly closed curtain on the bed to her right.
She stepped in, quickly checked the temperature of the groggy figure lying there, muttering, “Thirty-seven—good, fever’s down.” Then she efficiently swapped out the IV bag.
Fu Tingli didn’t process it at first.
But Doctor Mu had already finished up, stepped out, and pulled the curtain shut again. Turning, she caught Fu Tingli’s dazed stare.
Doctor Mu narrowed her eyes with a grin.
As if reading her mind, she came over and pulled Fu Tingli’s curtain halfway open, leaving just enough gap for her to see next door perfectly.
Then she went to the next bed and tugged its curtain halfway too, exposing the upper half of the person there so she could see Fu Tingli as well.
Only then did Doctor Mu shove her hands into the pockets of her white coat, turn around, and look at her.
“No charge at the aid station. Finish your IVs, and you two can both go—find somewhere else to rest. Don’t hog the space.”
Before walking away, she added a warning: “Don’t move until those bags are empty! I don’t want to re-stick you. It was hard enough giving your girlfriend several tries already!”
After that, Fu Tingli first realized the bed next door held Kong Liyuan—and then registered the particularly jarring term “girlfriend.”
She thought Doctor Mu had some weird ideas. How could Kong Liyuan be her girlfriend?
Finally, she threw back the covers to get up, but it tugged the IV needle. Seeing blood backflow up the line, she recalled the “don’t move” warning. She froze for a moment, then obediently lay back down.
Doctor Mu was something else—anticipating her moves with that warning, parting the curtains just enough to let her see the next bed.
Just that “girlfriend” bit was off.
This escape from the snow had made it clear her stamina wasn’t what it had been at twenty.
That earth-shattering car crash at twenty—she’d been rushed to the hospital covered in blood, but after a day and a half of rest, she’d been bouncing around, climbing out of bed with bandages still oozing. She’d even blown out birthday candles.
At twenty-four years old, she had weathered a snowstorm that wasn’t even particularly fierce, yet it had left her body aching in layers upon layers, with no visible external injuries to show for it.
Now that she was awake, even the slightest movement made her wince and grimace in pain, forcing her to sink back into the hospital bed. She turned her head just a fraction and glanced toward the shadowy figure in the neighboring bed.
The two beds were spaced a fair distance apart, so she could only make out Kong Liyuan buried under the covers, dressed all in black. Strands of disheveled hair spilled out, framing skin that had lost its feverish flush and turned pallid. She still wore her face mask and beanie, though the baseball cap had been removed and folded neatly on the side table.
It seemed Doctor Mu had recognized Kong Liyuan after all and hadn’t removed her mask or hat.
Otherwise, there would surely have been visitors by now. A superstar like Kong Liyuan snowed in would be major news, and this rescue station clearly had no robust privacy measures. If word got out, crowds might already be gathering to gawk.
But while Doctor Mu had a sharp tongue, she was kind at heart, providing cover for them both.
Fu Tingli let out a quiet sigh of relief.
Yet she still couldn’t fathom why Kong Liyuan hadn’t left. Why hadn’t the Guide arranged for someone to pick her up? And since Doctor Mu had clearly identified Kong Liyuan, why had they claimed she was Fu Tingli’s girlfriend?
These nagging questions triggered a wave of pain that crashed through her chest like a thunderbolt from the lungs themselves.
She clutched the blanket over her and coughed a few times, desperately trying to stifle the deadly, incessant hacking.
But it wouldn’t be subdued.
It felt as if she were about to cough up a lung, roast it over a fire, and shove it back inside just to get some peace.
Her coughing disturbed the others. A rustle came from behind the nearby curtain, followed by someone turning over with a grumble.
And then there was Kong Liyuan on the other side.
Fu Tingli had been huddled under her covers, wondering how this cough would ever end.
Then, from beyond the blanket, came a few words, faint and ethereal as drifting snowflakes.
“Fu Tingli.”
They landed lightly, fluttering onto her heart.
Fu Tingli froze, and miraculously, the relentless cough paused with her, holding its breath for several seconds.
The itch in her throat faded like embers sputtering toward extinction.
She drew a careful breath, lifted the blanket from her face, and met a pair of eyes gazing her way.
Those deep eyes were half-obscured by tousled hair, the lashes gently lowered, seemingly serene and still.
