Ji Li didn't react for a moment: "So?"
"I thought it would be over before school ended. There was no clock in the meeting room. When I went downstairs to your classroom, I found you were gone."
So it wasn't intentional for him to be absent.
"I'm sorry." Ying Yunsheng calmed his breathing. "I should have told you beforehand."
Ji Li shook his head: "No need to apologize."
There was no obligation for me to notify him.
Ying Yunsheng saw that the classroom was locked and chased after her without thinking. He even thought that if she had already gone home, he would go to her house to explain things clearly. Even if he was just imagining things, he had experienced what it was like to wait for someone and never see them four years ago, and he didn't want her to misunderstand.
He paused for a few seconds before noticing the car next to him: "Are you in a hurry to get home?"
Ji Li paused, recalling the message he had just received, and said, "Not in a hurry."
That means something's wrong.
Ying Yunsheng glanced at the license plate number twice and wrote it down: "Be careful on the road."
Ji Li didn't get in the car: "You have something to say to me?"
Ying Yunsheng: "Yes."
Just as Ji Li was about to ask, the other person added, "It's the same if I tell you when you return to school tomorrow."
Ying Yunsheng opened the car door, watched the other person get in, and suddenly reached out to stop him from closing the door: "What happened to your leg?"
Ji Li said, "It's nothing."
Ying Yunsheng frowned, placed his hand on the other man's right knee, and pressed down with his fingers. He didn't use much force, but he still saw the other man involuntarily pull back: "Does it hurt?"
Unable to hide it any longer, Ji Li could only say, "I accidentally bumped into something while crossing the street just now."
"What caused the collision?"
"The railing." Ji Li saw him pursing his lips and subconsciously comforted him, "It's nothing serious, it just hurts a little for a while, it'll be fine tomorrow."
Ying Yunsheng didn't reply, but fastened his seatbelt, then took a step back and slammed the door shut.
A few seconds later, the other car door opened wide.
Ying Yunsheng sat down and said to the front, "Master, please go to the city hospital."
Ji Li was taken aback: "No need to go to the hospital, it's just a minor injury."
Ying Yunsheng: "Go to the hospital."
The driver glanced in the rearview mirror, probably figuring out who had the upper hand, and decisively betrayed his benefactor, changing the destination: "Okay, let's go to the city hospital now."
.
After Ji Li got out of the car, Ying Yunsheng helped him inside.
Originally, Ying Yunsheng insisted on carrying him on his back, but he refused, so the other party changed from a means of transportation to a cane.
Ying Yunsheng registered him and took him to get a CT scan.
While waiting for the results, Ji Li texted Lin Chengshuang and Aunt Lin to say he would be home late and that they didn't need to wait for him for dinner: "What were you trying to say to me before?"
Ying Yunsheng asked in confusion, "What?"
“When we got into the taxi earlier,” Ji Li reminded him, “didn’t you say you had something to tell me?”
Ying Yunsheng stood still, clutching the registration slip.
Judging from his expression, Ji Li could roughly guess what the other person wanted to say. After staring at him for a moment, he still spoke calmly: "Do you regret it?"
The air was still for a few seconds.
Ying Yunsheng lowered his head: "I regret it."
The metal wheels of the IV stand creaked as they rolled down the corridor, and the headlights of cars below shone through the gaps in the security bars before quickly going out.
“I’ve tried to distance myself from you, to prepare for the days when we won’t be together. Now we’re just ordinary classmates, and after graduation we’ll be friends who know each other but aren’t close. I’ll rejoin a new social circle, say hello if we bump into each other on the street, but then I won’t even invite you to a class reunion,” Ying Yunsheng said. “I thought I had succeeded, but yesterday I realized I still can’t do it.”
Ji Li couldn't quite explain her feelings when she asked, "What can't you do?"
Ying Yunsheng: "I can't bring myself to dislike you."
"Uh..." Ji Li took a full ten seconds to react: "What?"
“Yesterday I asked my deskmate a question: if something is destined to end in tragedy, would he still do it?” Ying Yunsheng said. “He countered by asking me, ‘If I’m destined to die in a hundred or eighty years, does that mean I shouldn’t live now?’”
"Well……"
"He understands this principle, and so do you, because you are also someone who knows there is danger ahead but still goes forward. Only I haven't understood it."
Ying Yunsheng squatted down, looked up at him sitting in the chair: "I know there is a weekly test tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow we will enter the first round of review for the first year. A year later, even the countdown on the blackboard will only have two digits left. But none of these things have happened yet, and no one knows if any accidents will happen, such as a sudden global disaster that directly causes the college entrance examination to be postponed. So we still have to go to school now."
"I'm still here now, and you're still doing well. I can't really treat you like an ordinary classmate, so I don't want to continue like this with you."
Ying Yunsheng said, "I regret it. I shouldn't have wasted most of this semester."
Ji Li was stunned for a long time.
Ying Yunsheng called out to him, "Ji Li."
He said, "No matter what you want to do or where you want to go in the future, don't leave me, okay?"
Chapter 44
Chapter 44
bruises
The broadcast announced Ji Li's appointment number.
The CT scan results showed no bone damage, but there was significant soft tissue contusion, and a full recovery is conservatively estimated to take more than half a month.
That was a really hard impact.
Ying Yunsheng rolled up his trouser leg and saw a large, bluish-purple bruise spreading from his knee. His brows furrowed: "Is this what you mean by 'nothing's wrong'?"
Ji Li tried to explain, "I really didn't feel much pain."
Ying Yunsheng didn't even look up: "So, am I blind?"
"Uh..." Ying Yunsheng was usually gentle with him, but whenever it came to physical matters, he would immediately become tough and eloquent, as if he were a completely different person.
Ji Li sat on the bench and let him do as he pleased.
Ying Yunsheng applied the medicine to his wound, carefully pulled down his trouser leg, and then stood up, saying, "I'll take you home."
Ji Li: "I can go back by myself."
"I'll take you," Ying Yunsheng said before he could finish. "If you don't agree, I'll have to secretly follow you."
Ji Li couldn't persuade him, so he didn't try again.
The two returned to Lanxu Residential Area. Ying Yunsheng stopped downstairs and handed him the plastic bag containing the medicine: "Go upstairs. Let me know when you get to the balcony."
Ji Li took the plastic bag: "Okay."
He lived on a very high floor, and once they went upstairs, they couldn't really see each other's faces clearly.
Ying Yunsheng could see the balcony lights come on, and the shadow in front of the window beckoning to him.
.
On the first day of outdoor activities, the two met again in the cafeteria, each with their own paper and pen.
Although I didn't say more words than before during the class, the atmosphere was no longer oppressive.
It's like a string that's been taut for a long time suddenly loosening. When you touch it, you no longer have to worry about it breaking; a gentle rub or a pluck will only produce a pleasant echo.
Another weekend arrived. As usual, Ying Yunsheng went downstairs on Saturday afternoon after everyone had left, and saw Ji Li packing his schoolbag. Ji Li looked up and asked, "Have you had dinner yet?"
"No," Ying Yunsheng asked, "Are you in a hurry to go back today?"
Ji Li shook his head: "Let's go eat first."
The two men, each carrying a plastic bag, walked out of the pancake shop.
Ying Yunsheng asked, "Are you going back now?"
Ji Li shook his head: "Go back to school."
The two stepped into the school gate under the watchful eyes of the security guard and stopped in front of the teaching building.
Ji Li asked, "Is the classroom for tonight's evening self-study session on the third floor?"
Ying Yunsheng nodded subconsciously.
Ji Li: "Then let's go now."
Ying Yunsheng didn't understand at first: "Aren't you going home this weekend? I'll take you to the intersection first, and then I'll go back..."
"But I'm staying at school this week too."
Ying Yunsheng was stunned for a few seconds: "Huh?"
Ji Li patiently repeated, "I'm staying at school this week too."
Ying Yunsheng snapped out of his reverie: "Do you have a competition this weekend? Or a school activity?"
Ji Li chuckled upon hearing this: "Why can't it just be because I want to live on campus?"
Ying Yunsheng opened his mouth, then closed it again.
“Okay, seriously,” Ji Li said. “Because someone asked me not to leave him wherever I go, I thought about it for a week and realized that he might be shy if I let him stay at my house every week from now on, so I might as well live at school with him.”
Ying Yunsheng was still carrying a plastic bag in his hand, the pancakes inside steaming hot, making his fingers curl up from the heat.
Ji Li touched his face with the bag: "Ying, are you touched?"
Ying Yunsheng grabbed his wrist: "I can only go home once a week, you don't need to stay here just for me."
“You’re making me feel guilty by saying that,” Ji Li said. “I don’t have parents at home either. For me, the neighborhood and school are just different places. It doesn’t make it seem like I’ve made a huge sacrifice.”
Ying Yunsheng remained silent.
“Besides,” Ji Li laughed, “didn’t you say before that now that the science and humanities classes have different dismissal times every day, there’s practically no chance for us to meet?”