The situation was urgent. If Huang Yelin's head injury wasn't stitched up immediately, the bleeding wouldn't stop. Even if the wound was forcibly sealed with medical tape, there was still a risk of infection. No one in the room could make a decision for Huang Yelin. He endured the pain and said to Chen Yunqi, "Teacher, it's okay. Just bandage it up like Sheng Qinyu did. It'll be fine in a few days. I don't need to go to the hospital."
Tang Yutao looked at Chen Yunqi and spread his hands: "Li Hui and I have absolutely no medical knowledge or nursing skills. We've always relied on Song Feifei. We'll listen to you, what do you suggest?"
Looking at Huang Yelin's blood-stained face, Chen Yunqi made up his mind: "Find a needle and thread, I'll sew it up first, then go down the mountain."
Tang Yutao didn't hesitate at all: "Okay. You're not familiar with the county, so Li Hui will stay behind, and I'll go with you."
Li Hui ran quickly and got a needle and thread from San San's house, then helped Chen Yunqi wash his hands. The village chief, having received the news, also rushed over to check on the situation. Tang Yutao discussed with him about calling a car to go to the foot of the mountain to pick them up.
San San also arrived and stood by, holding a flashlight to illuminate Huang Yelin's wound for Chen Yunqi.
Chen Yunqi had absolutely no knowledge of surgical emergency suturing. He maintained a calm facade, but inwardly he was exclaiming that this was asking too much. He recalled that the surgical needles used in movies were paperclip-shaped? Was it like his grandmother sewing his pants, just threading it back and forth? Oh well, even if I haven't eaten pork, I've seen pigs run, right? Let's get started!
He soaked the cotton thread in iodine, picked out the thinnest sewing needle, disinfected it again and again, and then said to Huang Yelin, "Teacher is going to stitch you up now. It might hurt a lot, but please bear with it, okay? Trust me."
The children in the mountains are all tough and not pretentious. Huang Yelin nodded very sensibly and said, "Teacher Chen, you sew it. I can bear it."
Without a second thought, Chen Yunqi took a deep breath, mustered his courage, pinched the sewing needle with his two slender fingers, and used his other hand to forcefully close the wound together before starting to sew.
There was a strange, dull sensation as the needle pierced the flesh, and with each stitch, he could feel Huang Yelin trembling almost imperceptibly. The sewing needle was too thin and too short, slippery with tissue fluid and blood, and wouldn't obey his commands. He pulled the thread forcefully through his scalp, desperately trying to steady his hand; in the dead of winter, a layer of cold sweat beaded on his forehead.
Apart from Tang Yutao, who was on the phone outside, and the village chief, everyone inside the house held their breath and stared at him intently. Huang Yelin gritted his teeth, enduring the pain without uttering a single groan.
Chen Yunqi used eight stitches to barely close the laceration. He then disinfected the wound with iodine and bandaged it several times. After finishing, without even catching his breath, he put one of his own coats on Huang Yelin, then squatted down with his back to Huang Yelin and said, "Come on, I'll carry you down the mountain."
Before Huang Yelin could react, San San bent down and pulled Chen Yunqi up, saying, "You're too tall, you'll be unsteady going down the mountain. I'm used to walking this path, I'll carry you."
After saying that, she turned around and squatted down. Huang Yelin stood there, not knowing what to do. San San urged, "Huang Yelin, hurry up, don't dawdle."
This was the first time Chen Yunqi had heard San San speak in such a decisive, resolute, and unyielding tone. He didn't know what to say for a moment, but he knew that this was not the time to be competitive or concerned with saving face. San San was right. He wasn't familiar with the road yet, and with his height, he was already unsteady. If he carried someone on his back, it would be troublesome if they fell.
When Huang Yelin was carried out, the village chief had already arranged a car. He, along with San San's parents and aunt who had caught up, saw Chen Yunqi and the others off at the crossroads leading down the mountain. Before parting, Huang Yelin instructed the villagers to go back and tell Huang Shuai's grandmother to take care of his mother and Huang Xiaoya, and not to tell them about his injury.
Chen Yunqi and Tang Yutao led the way for San San, one in front and one behind. Although Huang Yelin was thin, an eight-year-old child must have weighed at least forty pounds, and San San carried him steadily without even panting. Chen Yunqi suddenly realized that he had almost forgotten that San San was a boy who grew up in the mountains. Usually, he was always well-behaved and quiet, staying with him, but now, with a serious expression and brisk steps, he exuded a steadiness and strength from the mountains, as well as a composure and tenacity beyond his years.
Chen Yunqi and San San were exhausted after going up and down twice in one day. Fortunately, the car had already arrived from the town and was waiting by the roadside.
There were no streetlights, only the faint glow of car headlights, which looked like the only glimmer of hope in the endless darkness. After descending the mountain, San San put Huang Yelin in the car, wiped the sweat from her brow, and stood by the roadside to say to Chen Yunqi, "I'll take you this far. Be careful on the road."
Chen Yunqi was still panting, and he couldn't see San San's face clearly in the darkness. Thinking that San San would have to go back to the mountain alone later, he felt a pang of heartache and reluctance. He couldn't help but walk over and hold San San's hand, gently stroking his cheek with his other hand, saying, "You've worked hard. Rest for a bit and then go back quickly. Be careful too, and let me know when you get home."
San San smiled, revealing her bright eyes and white teeth: "Okay, I understand."
The old, worn-out Jinbei van carrying three people bumped along its way to Haiyuan County.
Exhausted from a night of torment and pain, Huang Yelin fell asleep in Chen Yunqi's arms. The bloodstains on his face had not yet been wiped clean. Looking at his still-childish face, Chen Yunqi carefully tucked the clothes covering him tighter.
The driver glanced at Chen Yunqi in the back seat through the rearview mirror and asked, "Who are you to this kid?"
"Teacher," Tang Yutao replied, looking down at his phone.
The driver, probably bored driving at night, started making small talk with them. "What happened to this kid? Why is there so much blood? Won't it get on my car?"
Tang Yutao grew impatient, reached out and turned on the car radio. Amidst the static, he tuned in and out until he found a midnight music program that was barely audible to the driver, thus indicating that he didn't want to chat.
The driver was a little embarrassed and stopped talking. Chen Yunqi felt bad about using someone else's car so late at night, but still politely said, "The child was hit on the head by a stone. There are no adults at home, so we're taking him to the hospital."
The driver said "Oh," and after a moment he couldn't help but say, "Your teachers are so kind. The children in the mountains have such lowly lives; they often fall and die because the roads are bad. That's why people there love to have four or five children; they're afraid that if one of them falls and dies, they'll have none left."
Chen Yunqi regretted acknowledging him. He checked again to make sure Huang Yelin was asleep and hadn't heard what he said.
Another awkward silence ensued, and the driver, bored, rolled down the window to smoke and try to stay awake. Chen Yunqi also wanted one, but with Huang Yelin in his arms, he resisted and leaned back in his seat, closing his eyes to rest.
There were few cars on the road at night, and the journey was relatively smooth. It was already late at night when they arrived at Haiyuan County People's Hospital. Chen Yunqi paid the fare and received a message from San San:
"Brother Xiaoqi, I'm home now, don't worry."
Upon seeing this line of text, Chen Yunqi realized that he felt a sense of relief, as if he had let go of a worry. He quickly typed a reply:
"Okay, get some rest. We're at the hospital now."
The emergency surgeon brought Huang Yelin into the examination room, examined the horribly stitched wound, and frowned as he asked, "Who stitched this up?"
Chen Yunqi and Tang Yutao spoke at the same time:
"I."
"he."
The doctor glanced at them, first calling a nurse over to help remove the stitches and re-stitch them, then said, "This stitching is really poorly done, but it did save the day."
The wound needed to be treated again, and a tetanus shot was required. The doctor recommended a CT scan to check for any other problems and told Chen Yunqi and Tang Yutao to go register and pay the fees first. With Huang Yelin handed over to the professional doctor, Chen Yunqi finally felt relieved and instantly felt extremely tired. After paying the fees, he returned to the clinic entrance, stretched out his long legs, and sat on a bench to rest.
Only then did he have time to recall carefully. Chen Yunqi felt like he had just woken up from a dream. He had actually helped someone sew up? He was incredibly bold. Luckily, nothing went wrong. Thinking about it now, he felt a little scared.
Listening to the footsteps and voices coming and going in the hospital corridor, Chen Yunqi gradually became sleepy and leaned his head against the wall, closing his eyes and pretending to sleep.
Tang Yutao suddenly said, "Chen Yunqi, I think San San likes you."
The drowsiness vanished instantly. Chen Yunqi opened his eyes, sat up straight, and pretended to be calm as he looked at Tang Yutao and said, "What?"
Tang Yutao rolled his eyes: "You're just pretending. You clearly heard me. Just now, before you got in the car, you held San San's hand and touched his face. The way San San looked at you couldn't lie."
"He must have fallen for you."
The topic started too suddenly. Chen Yunqi had just relaxed and was completely unprepared. He was speechless for a moment and didn't know how to answer.
He was silent for a moment before replying, seemingly unrelated, "You can see clearly even in such darkness?"
Tang Yutao pointed to his eyes: "No clue can escape my discerning eyes."
Chen Yunqi originally wanted to say, "There's no such thing as a pair, it's just one," but then he felt it would be impolite to make fun of someone's shortcomings, so he held back.
Tang Yutao sighed and said, "This is a difficult matter."
Chen Yunqi was somewhat puzzled. "Difficult to handle?"
“Definitely!” Tang Yutao pushed up his glasses: “People in the mountains are not enlightened. Homosexuality is a fantasy to them, something they have never heard of or seen before. If they find out, San San will be in trouble.”
Chen Yunqi frowned and said somewhat guiltily, "Aren't you overthinking it? San San treats me like an older brother."
"Big brother?" Tang Yutao's glasses slipped down again. He didn't bother to push them up and glared at him, saying, "Have some mercy, I'll call you big brother. Have you ever seen a younger brother blush when he sees his older brother? Which older brother holds hands and touches the cheeks of his younger brother? What else have you two done when you're alone together?"
"If you insist that you're not gay, I have nothing to say. But if you really aren't, I advise you not to mess with San San."
Tang Yutao looked at Chen Yunqi, who was bowing his head and remaining silent, and said helplessly, "Don't think that San San is weak. Once a person like her falls in love, she will be devoted to him."
“Silly San San, his feelings for you are doomed to fail. It’s harder for him than to escape his impoverished fate.”
A note from the author:
--- The suturing process described in this chapter is a non-standard procedure. Do not attempt to refer to or imitate it if you do not have the necessary surgical conditions!
Chapter Twenty: Gifts
Tang Yutao's words made Chen Yunqi uneasy. He silently reflected on his actions, realizing that since meeting San San, many of his words and deeds had become somewhat out of control.
He and Yu Xiaosong had shared a bed countless times, but he had never made any inappropriate or ambiguous moves towards her. Whether it was when they were young and naive, lying together in matching pajamas, or when Yu Xiaosong deliberately pressed his bare chest against him as an adult, he never reached out to touch her. After Yu Xiaosong confessed her feelings to him, he adhered even more strictly to his principles, daring not to cross the line in the slightest.
Tang Yutao asked him if he had done anything else while he was alone with San San, and he felt guilty and dared not answer. Thinking back to the night he slept in San San's arms, her moist eyes, soft hair, slender waist, and the faint scent of grass on her body, he felt a strange infatuation with her.
Yu Xiaosong is a restless sleeper; he kicks off the covers in the summer and tries to steal them in the winter. Chen Yunqi isn't used to sleeping with anyone else besides him, and even with him, Chen Yunqi only does so because he's grown up with it and can't bring himself to push him away. San San, however, is different. He barely moved all night, quietly curled up in Chen Yunqi's arms.
Before this, Chen Yunqi had always been clear that he had no romantic feelings for Xiaosong, nor any romantic impulses, and based on this, he concluded that he was not attracted to the same sex. But now he was no longer so certain. He thought he treated San San like a younger brother, but as Tang Yutao said, what normal person would act so intimately towards their younger brother? His uncontrollable light touches and caresses, his involuntary gentle tone, were clearly the way he would treat a lover.
This isn't right, Chen Yunqi thought to himself. There must be some misunderstanding. It must be because of his long-term depression and inner loneliness that these involuntary behaviors occurred. He must have poured his unresolved longing for his grandfather into San San, and used San San as a safe haven to escape reality.
Thinking of this, Chen Yunqi felt a little flustered. If his seemingly unintentional but extremely irresponsible behavior caused San San to fall in love, Chen Yunqi dared not imagine the consequences he might face next.
As dawn broke, a ray of morning sunlight shone into the ward through the window. Chen Yunqi temporarily put aside the tangled thoughts in his mind and wearily rubbed his temples.
Huang Yelin's wound had been re-stitched and was no longer a problem. A large patch of hair on the back of his head had been shaved off, and the bandages were neatly wrapped. Since the emergency room couldn't take X-rays, he was temporarily kept in the hospital for observation. He would have a CT scan done in the morning after the radiologist came to work, and if there were no problems, he would be discharged. At this moment, he was lying in the hospital bed, fast asleep, unaware of the glaring sunlight falling on his face.
Chen Yunqi got up and drew the curtains for him.
The small ward crammed with four beds. Tang Yutao sat on a red plastic stool, asleep at the foot of the bed. The patients in the next beds gradually woke up, and their family members began to fold up cots and help them with toileting, washing, and eating. The once quiet ward gradually became noisy.
Chen Yunqi washed his face with cold water and planned to go out to buy breakfast. Breakfast stalls had already been set up along the roadside outside the hospital gate. He leaned against a doorway, smoked a cigarette, and then bought tofu pudding and fried dough sticks. He also bought braised chicken legs and lean meat porridge specifically for Huang Yelin. The child had lost so much blood; he needed to be well-nourished.
I bought bottled water at the small supermarket and picked up two pieces of chocolate from the counter while paying.
The county town is peaceful and serene in winter. Early risers, wearing thick cotton hats, ride motorcycles along the roads. Haiyuan County's specialty is Sichuan peppercorns, and almost every shop has sacks of peppercorns displayed outside, filling the air with a numbing aroma.
Chen Yunqi followed the scent back to the hospital ward and found Tang Yutao still asleep, while Huang Yelin was awake, lying on the bed staring blankly at the ceiling. Upon seeing him return, Huang grinned at him.
Chen Yunqi tilted the hospital bed up so he could sit up and eat breakfast. Huang Yelin was starving, and he quickly finished the chicken leg and porridge. After finishing, he wiped his mouth and said to Chen Yunqi, "Teacher Chen, thank you for bringing me to the hospital."
"Don't be so polite with me, I really want to thank you. Just be less mischievous in the future and be more polite to others." Chen Yunqi unscrewed the bottle cap and handed over the water.
Huang Yelin stuck out his tongue a little embarrassedly, drank some water, and then lowered his head to think. After a moment, he looked up at Chen Yunqi with a somewhat dim look in his eyes and said, "Teacher Chen, how much did it cost to see the doctor? You...you can keep track of it for me...I'll definitely pay you back when I grow up and earn money."
Seeing his hesitant yet determined expression, Chen Yunqi smiled and said, "Okay, I'll remember that."
After breakfast, the doctor came to check on Huang Yelin and, seeing that he was in good spirits, arranged for him to have a CT scan. Tang Yutao was woken up by the noise; half of his face was red from being pressed against the bed, and his hair was a mess. After hastily eating the tofu pudding that Chen Yunqi had bought, he climbed onto Huang Yelin's bed to rest while Huang Yelin was away.
"I'm really getting old," he sighed with his eyes closed. "When I was in college, I would stay up all night with girls to watch the moon and count stars, and I could go straight to class in the morning. Now, if I stay up all night, I can't make up for it in a week. I'm so weak."
He looked up at Chen Yunqi again. Although he had also stayed up all night, Chen Yunqi showed no signs of fatigue. He sat there with his back straight and his hair was still neat.
"Being young is fucking great."
Chen Yunqi was actually exhausted, but he habitually maintained a meticulous demeanor. He smiled and asked Tang Yutao, "What are your plans after leaving Tianyun Village?"
"Go to Tibet and become a monk." Tang Yutao said with his eyes closed, a detached and self-satisfied expression on his face.
Chen Yunqi thought he had misheard. "Become a monk? Don't you still want to enjoy the world's pleasures? Are you willing to give that up?"
Tang Yutao simply sat up and said seriously, "I am reluctant to part with her, I haven't even used half of my seventy-two tricks yet. But I am a person without ambition, and a girl won't be happy with me. A fleeting romance will end in one night! I am not the kind of person who is suitable for marriage."
"Seventy-two what?" Chen Yunqi looked blank.
"Damn, you really know how to listen to the important points," Tang Yutao glared at him and said, "Are you even from Earth? Didn't you watch porn and read erotic novels with your classmates when you were in school? You don't even know the 72 positions?"
Chen Yunqi shook his head, "I don't have any close classmates, just one, and I've never heard him mention him."
“I’ve heard of the Seventy-Two Transformations,” he added.
Tang Yutao looked at him incredulously, wanting to say he didn't believe it, but seeing Chen Yunqi's calm expression, he tentatively asked again, "You...you're not a virgin, are you?"
This was a truly awkward question. Chen Yunqi looked embarrassed, but after a moment he honestly replied, "Um, I've never done it."
Tang Yutao felt like his jaw was about to drop.
He opened his mouth and gave a stiff laugh: "Heh...hehehe..."