Chapter 24: 24. “My Doctor Said Alcohol is Bad for You” Part 1

The egg fried rice was a no-go.

Feeling apologetic, Yu Qinjiu brought out her secret weapon. “How about I go buy the wontons and soup dumplings from downstairs?”

Ji Qingyou rebelliously took a couple more bites of the egg fried rice. But after Yu Qinjiu, dissatisfied, snatched the bowl from her hands, she paused for a few seconds. “What else is in the fridge?”

Yu Qinjiu thought for a moment. “There’s a fish, but you don’t eat fish. There are also some ribs and a few vegetables. I was planning to follow a recipe and cook something nice to invite you over, but I didn’t have time…”

The more she spoke, the more embarrassed she looked. Finally, she just propped her face in her hands, puffing out her cheeks. “Okay, the truth is, I didn’t realize egg fried rice would take this long. I thought I could finish it in two hours, but I got home a bit late today…”

As she listened, Ji Qingyou stood up, opened the fridge, took out the fish and ribs, and walked into the kitchen. “I’ll do it.”

“Huh?” Yu Qinjiu followed her into the kitchen, watching her roll up her sleeves. She felt a bit awkward and came in to assist. “I was the one who wanted to cook you a nice meal to reward you for your hard work these past few days. How can I let you do it yourself? And if you don’t eat fish, why are you making it?”

“Well, if I’m cooking, at least we won’t go hungry for another two hours.” Ji Qingyou, in an uncharacteristically playful way, imitated Yu Qinjiu’s joking manner. “As for the fish, I can make it for you. You can eat it.”

Yu Qinjiu retorted, “Then it’d be faster to buy wontons and soup dumplings downstairs.”

Ji Qingyou thought about it seriously. “But that’s breakfast food.”

“Alright.” Yu Qinjiu tried to compromise, but then found a counterargument. “They sell dinner stuff downstairs too…”

Ji Qingyou washed the ribs and put them in a pot to blanch, saying casually, “I’ve tried all the shops downstairs. The places where you can actually have a full meal aren’t very good. Only a few noodle shops and breakfast places are decent.”

“Know it that well?” Yu Qinjiu noticed her hip accidentally bump the edge of the stove. She quickly reached out and pulled her back, then took down an apron. “Have you lived here long?”

“Since I started at the hospital, so a few years.” Ji Qingyou took the apron with one hand, the other still wet. She was about to grab a tissue to dry it.

The next second, a soft warmth came from behind.

The apron was taken by Yu Qinjiu. The straps wrapped around her waist, and then Yu Qinjiu came around behind her, deftly tying the apron for her.

This wasn’t an intimate gesture, but Ji Qingyou could practically feel Yu Qinjiu’s body heat.

The process was brief, yet it felt slow.

Brief enough that Ji Qingyou forgot to turn off the faucet. The sound of trickling water almost completely masked her breathing. Slow enough that Ji Qingyou felt like a balloon being filled with the scent of Yu Qinjiu, slowly expanding, teetering on the edge of danger, ready to burst at any touch.

She could only use her willpower to control herself.

Until Yu Qinjiu finished tying the apron and walked over to her side, asking, “Is there anything else to wash?”

Bang! The balloon burst.

Ji Qingyou belatedly snapped back to reality. She quickly turned off the faucet. “Just wash some green peppers and garlic. You wash them, and I’ll chop them.”

As she spoke, she put some distance between herself and Yu Qinjiu, using the need to chop vegetables as an excuse.

Yu Qinjiu readily agreed. She took Ji Qingyou’s place, turned the faucet back on, and in the sound of the running water, she was quiet for a moment before asking,

“This place isn’t really close to the hospital, though. Why did you suddenly decide to move out?”

Ji Qingyou pulled her wandering thoughts together and answered. “Soon after I graduated, Grandfather got sick and passed away. Mom was worried Grandmother would be too sad, so she brought her to live with us. That’s when I moved out.”

She spoke without much expression, and her chopping didn’t stop.

But Yu Qinjiu knew very well that the cause-and-effect relationship between “bringing Grandmother to live with them” and “Ji Qingyou moving out” wasn’t as simple as Ji Qingyou’s two light sentences described.

Every time she ran into those two elders of the Qin family, Ji Qingyou would be in a negative state for a long time, retreating back into her own world.

Yu Qinjiu never understood why Ji Qingyou’s grandparents treated her with a kind of “cold sarcasm.” Both were adopted by Qin Bailan, yet Qin Shuangchi was seen as the heir to the medical family, while Ji Qingyou, in their eyes, was less valuable than an outsider.

Noticing Yu Qinjiu’s distraction, Ji Qingyou knew she was feeling indignant on her behalf again. More than herself, Yu Qinjiu would get angrier at the “unfair treatment” she received.

If she herself was a robot incapable of expressing emotions accurately, then Yu Qinjiu was the human closest to her, capable of the deepest empathy with her rigid, dull self.

Time had passed.

Although Ji Qingyou rarely thought about her grandparents’ time on this earth anymore, she still felt a great deal of comfort from Yu Qinjiu’s irrational partisanship.

“A few years ago, after Grandmother also passed away, my mom and sister kept asking me to move back home. One time, they even came directly and packed up all my things. But I snuck back and moved out again. I’m used to living here now. Going back feels unfamiliar.” Ji Qingyou recounted this in an exceptionally calm tone, even sounding a bit light-hearted.

In front of Yu Qinjiu, she always seemed able to easily open herself up, no matter what was inside.

Yu Qinjiu stared at her for a moment, then slapped all the washed vegetables onto the chopping board to her right, saying childishly, “If I were you, I wouldn’t call them Grandpa and Grandma.”

“…Mm.” Ji Qingyou looked sideways at her. “But when you first met them, you called them Grandma and Grandpa too.”

Yu Qinjiu frowned slightly. “I didn’t know any better back then. I was just over four…”

Ji Qingyou imitated her tone. “Well, I was only five then.”

Yu Qinjiu conceded defeat. “Okay. Neither of us knew any better.”

Ji Qingyou hummed in agreement. “You’re right.”

“Ji Qingyou…” Yu Qinjiu suddenly called her name. “How much older are you than me anyway?”

Ji Qingyou answered quickly. “186 days. Six months and six days.”

Yu Qinjiu seemed satisfied with her answer. “Still remember it so clearly.”

Ji Qingyou said, “I have a good memory.”

Yu Qinjiu nodded, then asked hesitantly, “Do you remember anything from before you were five, before you were taken in? About your biological parents?”

“I remember some things. But mostly about that man.” Ji Qingyou’s movements slowed down considerably, as if sinking into shards of memory. “I don’t think it was this city. It was a hot coastal city. My… biological father…”

She stumbled over the word, but continued. “He was a man of few words, barely spoke to me. He left early and came home late. When he was home, if he wasn’t sleeping, he was writing something or dealing with his own business. I heard the neighbors gossiping. I apparently learned to speak quite late. The first word I learned was ‘fish.’ Because it was the word he used most often on the phone. He seemed to be the owner of a seafood market.”

“One day it was raining. I found a little goldfish in a puddle by the roadside. It was very thin, barely alive. I tried many things, eventually keeping it in a soup bowl that I used as a fish tank.”

Hearing this, Yu Qinjiu unconsciously curled her fingers, trying her best to read Ji Qingyou’s expression and emotions.

Ji Qingyou didn’t meet Yu Qinjiu’s eyes. She just calmly handled the fish that was already in the pan. “Later, the little goldfish got more and more tired, swam slower and slower. I had to ask him for help. He looked at me for a moment, then asked if I liked the little goldfish. I said yes. He smiled. I was happy at the time. I didn’t think his smile was strange. I just thought that because I liked it, he would help me save it.”

“But he didn’t.”

“He took the little goldfish out of the bowl, held it tightly, and forced me to stare into its eyes. He told me that if I liked something, I had to hold it tight, try my best to keep it in my hands.”

“Then he crushed the little goldfish. He wasn’t even wearing gloves. His hands were covered in a lingering, fishy stench. I hadn’t even eaten anything, but I threw up.”

Ji Qingyou lowered her eyes, calmly flipping the beautifully colored fish in the pan. “Later, I found out that my biological mother died in childbirth. So I don’t remember her. I only remember my biological father. The memory of the little goldfish is the most vivid one I have of him.”

To this day, she only had a blurry memory of that so-called father’s face. But she could still recall his eerie smile. Every time she ate fish, she could smell that fishy smell from back then, and she could still picture the little goldfish’s eyeball bursting open in front of her.

She was never able to eat fish again.

And she had never told anyone about this.

But from that day on, Ji Qingyou didn’t dare to admit she liked anything anymore. It was the exact opposite of what her biological father intended. The moment she realized she liked something, the more she didn’t dare admit it or keep it by her side.

As if, as long as she liked something even a little bit, she would be reminded of the little goldfish being crushed in front of her. And the things or people she liked would, because of her liking them, be inexplicably hurt.

And many times, that’s exactly what happened.

When she was little, she found a kitten. A very young blue and white. Her older cousin came to visit and saw it. That evening at dinner, Uncle asked if she could give the kitten to Cousin. She was trying to please the Qin family back then, so she hesitantly agreed.

But Cousin didn’t really like that kitten. Later, Ji Qingyou found out the kitten had died after being taken by Cousin. Cousin told her spitefully, “Oh, I’m actually allergic to cat hair. But I saw you liked it, so I wanted to take it from you. I wanted to see if they would side with me or with you.”

She still remembered.

Cousin had snickered and said:

“Boring. Same as always.”

That sentence made her tremble all over.

Later, Ji Qingyou understood more and more: Sometimes, the more you want to protect the things you like, the more you need to hide that liking.

The memory ended.

Ji Qingyou looked at Yu Qinjiu, trying to lighten the mood. “Compared to him, I guess Grandpa and Grandma weren’t so bad?”

Yu Qinjiu didn’t take her joke. She just quietly stared at her.

Under the dim kitchen light, Yu Qinjiu’s eyes gradually reddened. A hazy layer of mist rose in her light-colored pupils.

Compared to Yu Qinjiu’s reaction.

Ji Qingyou, who had just told the story, seemed very relaxed. She even served the fish she had cooked, carefully wiping the gravy from the edge of the bowl. “This fish came out pretty good.”

Yu Qinjiu sniffled, picked up the bowl she had filled, looked at it for a moment, and said softly, “We won’t eat fish anymore.”

She was talking about “we,” about “the future.”

It was like an oath, making it hard for Ji Qingyou, in that second, to remember that “the future” for them was something destined to separate them, on opposite sides of the world.

Ji Qingyou didn’t think she was being childish. She just pursed her lips and said, “You can eat it.”

“No.” Yu Qinjiu shook her head, whispering, “I find it smells fishy too.”

She then poured the beautifully cooked fish into the trash can. Her drooping eyelashes were stuck together with tiny, wet beads.

Ji Qingyou was surprised by her action. But she felt no dissatisfaction. Even though she had just spent time and effort cooking that fish, she felt no resentment.

How could Yu Qinjiu find it fishy?

When this question popped into her head, Ji Qingyou saw Yu Qinjiu’s trembling hand as she gently placed the bowl in the sink. She saw Yu Qinjiu look up at her, and heard her repeat the words, word by word.

“We won’t eat fish anymore.”

~ ~ ~

In the end, the only dishes they had were braised pork ribs and stir-fried greens.

Yu Qinjiu felt sorry for not having prepared the meal properly. “Next time, I’ll make sure I’m fully prepared before I call you. That way you won’t have to come over and do the cooking.”

“First, tell me if my cooking is any good.” Ji Qingyou changed the subject.

“Alright.” Yu Qinjiu poured her a glass of water, then picked up a rib. Her eyes lit up the moment it touched her lips, but she quickly frowned. “Spicy.”