Chapter 285 Yu

This summer morning.

There are raindrops that smell like grass and a few plum-like stars.

Chu Jian got up.

As usual, I fetched two buckets of water from the well, washed the clothes and hung them in the yard. After my mother cooked the noodles, she used tongs to dig out the carbon ash that still had sporadic flames in the earthen stove, put two unpeeled raw corns in, and then buried them and simmered them slowly.

After Chu Dapeng left, perhaps people were a little uncomfortable, but the family became much calmer. Jiang Feng worked at Zhangji Qifengdu Fish Powder Shop with Chu Xin every day, and Chu Jian went to and from school on time.

Of course, the knot that was branded in this family is still there. Chu Jian will never forget the scene in the city’s First People’s Hospital early that morning. There was a body covered in blood lying on an iron frame, his mother was crying and almost fainted, and Chu Xin, who had never spoken, was lying beside him, struggling to call for his father.

The bitter wind and severe rain enveloped this disaster-stricken family.

On the second night after Chu Dapeng's car accident, all the relatives, friends and neighbors in Hongshan Lane, whom Chu Dapeng usually called aunts, uncles, and uncles, stood in the house, repeating the same words over and over again: "Once a person dies, he can't come back to life." "Besides, if God wants to take someone away, even the emperor can't do anything about it." At that time, she knelt in the yard and burned nine pounds and three ounces of paper money, and after putting the ashes in a cloth bag, she used it as a pillow for her stepfather. There were six piles of fire rising from the gate of the yard, the smoke was diffused, and the firelight reflected people's faces, giving people a feeling of being in the other world amid the sobbing of her mother.

Chu Jian was extremely tired and extremely awake. During those days, she couldn't sleep all day and all night. She just endured it, doing what she could and couldn't do, until Zhang Yunqi came back. He didn't know that there was a tsunami in her heart the moment she saw him, but she stood there quietly, not letting anyone know.

After returning to the adobe hut from the funeral that day, my mother seemed to have lost her sense of grief and often sat in the yard in a daze. Perhaps grief is no longer grief when it continues to the extreme. I couldn't empathize with my mother when I first met her. Why did this gambler and drunkard make my mother cry so much?
She thought about it over and over again, but couldn't remember anything good about him.

One year, the family killed a pig and he took the money away. He hid in a neighbor's house and played mahjong for three days and three nights. When the family ran out of food, her mother carried her on her back to call him home. He lost so much money that he beat and scolded her and sent her back. He went back to the casino and lost all his money. Then he stopped and came back.

In her 17 years of life, she had experienced so many things like this that she became numb. This family had once made her feel that life was all about endurance, that pessimism was the basic attitude towards life, and that there would be no lasting happiness in life. When she was very young, she always liked to stare blankly at the fiery clouds in the sky. Before she had a complete understanding of the world, she always wanted to go to a faraway place to find something.

She felt that there was a warm place far away in the sky.

She thought of Zhang Yunqi.

At dawn, the light blue sky was cleared by the wind.

A few small silver stars and a scimitar-like moon were nailed obliquely in the sky.

After breakfast, before going out, Chu Jian used tongs to dig out the charcoal ash in the earthen stove. Two corns were already cooked and were emitting the aroma of charcoal fire. She put them in a bag and took them out.

After school yesterday, Yunqi took her shopping. They met a vendor selling roasted corn on Ximen Street. He ran over to buy some, grinning as he ate, saying that he hadn't eaten the roasted corn from his hometown for a long time. He also said that when he was in elementary school, Ji Ling would go to his hometown to play every summer vacation, and she would secretly run with him to other people's fields to dig corn and roast it on the mountain.

When we arrived at No. 1 Middle School and passed the football field, the track was empty. Yunqi did not come to run today. Chu Jian glanced at the roasted corn in his hand and it seemed a little cold.

She pursed her lips and continued walking forward. On a tree-lined avenue, she met Lin Zihao somewhat unexpectedly. She had not thought about why this boy appeared here so early. She nodded to him as a greeting. When she was about to leave, Lin Zihao, who was standing motionless in front of her, called her.

When I first met you, I asked, "What's the matter?"

Lin Zihao was silent for a while, and suddenly said, "I'm sorry."

I didn't understand at first: "What?"

"Your father's matter..."

"This has nothing to do with you, you don't have to think too much about it."

"But...don't you understand what I mean?"

"I see."

"I like you."

"I don't like you." This sentence almost came out of her mouth when she first saw him, and she walked straight past him.

"Is it because of Zhang Yunqi?" Lin Zihao's voice was hoarse.

"This has nothing to do with you." Chu Jian stopped walking. After a moment, she turned around and took out a few banknotes from her schoolbag. She folded them neatly and handed them to Lin Zihao with both hands: "Here is the money."

"What do you mean?"

"Last time everyone asked me to treat you to drinks, but I didn't have any money, so you paid for it privately, right? Thank you, but I don't know how much you spent. This is all I have now. I'm really sorry. I wanted to save up more money to give you. Tell me how much you still owe me, and I'll pay you back when I save up enough." (Note: The clue to this plot is in Chapter 35)
Lin Zihao's body couldn't stop shaking, he finally realized how cheap he was. However, many times, what hurts people the most is not the other party's ruthlessness, but the persistence of fantasy: "If this money was paid by Zhang Yunqi, would you return it to him?"

Facing the questioning, Chu Jian couldn't understand Lin Zihao's thinking. She just felt that if you owe someone a favor, you should pay it back. If you have to compare, it was not him, Lin Zihao, but Zhang Yunqi that day. Zhang Yunqi would never hide it from her and treat everyone to drinks in her name. What's the point of having this face? She is poor and can't afford it, but she doesn't think that life is meaningless just because she is poor. However, the boy with a wealthy family in front of her will not understand this. He is always self-centered and always talks big. He doesn't understand that forcibly giving dignity to others is also a disguised form of discrimination! He doesn't understand that all she needs is a normal heart to treat everyone equally.

She said to him, "Why do you have to compare everything with Zhang Yunqi? You are not the same kind of people at all."

Lin Zihao's eyes were red. In fact, this boy was already good enough among his peers, but teenagers grow too slowly. He did not have enough life experience and mature perspective to look at problems. The girl in front of him had been fighting on the most difficult road since she was a child. Her understanding of life had reached a deeper level. He could not understand her thoughts at all. His right and wrong cause and effect were always very direct: "You like Zhang Yunqi."

Chu Jian nodded: "Yes, I like Zhang Yunqi."

Lin Zihao clenched his fists, his handsome face became distorted, his eyes were bloodshot, "What is it about Zhang Yunqi that is better than me? Appearance? Academic performance? Yes! You don't need to tell me, I know now that he is very rich, he opened a company at a young age, he knows a lot of officials, but are you the kind of vain and powerful girl? Don't you know? People are attracted to Ji Ling, the daughter of Ji Zhong! He is a gigolo! Without the relationship with Ji Ling, would Zhang Yunqi be where he is today? Would he care about a girl from a poor family like you?!"

Chu Jian took a deep look at the sky above the woods, and then looked at the hysterical boy in front of her. Her face was pale and bloodless, but her voice was calm as if she was talking about an ordinary thing: "And then? I still like him."

Lin Zihao laughed, and his laugh was so chilling. His father being thrown into prison, his family’s ruin, and the ridicule from others did not defeat this proud young man, but at this moment, the flower of viciousness had already grown wildly in the depths of his desperate heart!
He suddenly pulled out a fruit knife from his pocket, walked past Chu Jian and went straight back the way he came, and said in a hoarse voice: "You know what? I have nothing left, and there is no meaning in living." "What are you going to do?"

When she first saw him, she thought Lin Zihao was going to hurt himself. After hesitating for a moment, she immediately followed in the direction of Lin Zihao. However, Lin Zihao walked very fast, which made her feel more and more uneasy. Although she didn't know what Lin Zihao was going to do, she quickened her pace.

After walking through the tree-lined avenue and going up to their building, a few people passed by. Chu Jian shouted at Lin Zihao's back: "What are you doing? Wait a minute! Hold him back!"

Most of the people on the stairs were a little puzzled and didn't react. Lin Zihao rushed upstairs without saying a word. Chu Jian followed him panting. When he arrived at their floor, he saw Zhang Yunqi and Wang Xiaokai standing by the wall of the corridor chatting, facing outside. Lin Zihao had his hands in his pockets, as if he was afraid of disturbing Zhang Yunqi. He walked like a normal person, not fast, but was only more than ten steps away from Zhang Yunqi's back.

At that moment, Chu Jian's heartbeat seemed to stop. She finally understood what Lin Zihao was going to do. She didn't have time to think about anything else and rushed over recklessly: "Yunqi! Watch out behind you!"

Zhang Yunqi heard shouts and intense footsteps. He turned his head and a cold light reflecting the sun pierced his eyes. He then heard the sound of a piece of rag being torn in two. Then, two figures appeared in front of him: Chu Jian, who was standing in front of him and reaching out to grab something, and Lin Zihao, who was holding a knife.

The knife was already stuck in Chu Jian's chest.

It was like being bitten by a poisonous snake, the blood coagulated instantly!
At that moment, Zhang Yunqi's head went into a state of dizziness, his heart was chilled to the freezing point, a tremor similar to the malaria surged from his body, and he was almost collapsed: "Fuck you! I'm going to kill your whole family!"

Zhang Yunqi kicked Lin Zihao, who had a distorted expression, to the ground, picked up Chu Jian by the waist, and ran towards the stairwell.

The corridor fell into a deathly silence. Men and women were dumbfounded. Wang Xiaokai, who was stunned, reacted and slapped Lin Zihao in the face. He pointed at Tian Zhuangzhuang and Yang Wei and shouted, "Watch him!" Then he ran towards Zhang Yunqi. He had known Zhang Yunqi for two years and knew his buddy's character too well. If something happened during their first meeting, the consequences would be unimaginable.

Early that morning, Zhang Ma was busy with business at Zhang Ji Qifengdu Fish Noodle Shop as usual. Business was good, and she sold nearly a hundred bowls of fish noodles in a short time. However, when she was leading a customer in to eat fish noodles, she unexpectedly saw the third child, Zhang Yunqi, holding Chu Jian and rushing to the middle of the road, directly forcing a private car to stop. Zhang Ma panicked and ran out in a panic, shouting, "Third child, what happened!"

Zhang Yunqi didn't hear it.

He almost begged the driver to take him to the hospital.

The private car driver was a middle-aged man. He was stopped by someone on the way and was furious. But when he saw the girl in Zhang Yunqi's arms, with a pale face, a knife stuck in her chest, and shocking bloodstains on her skirt, he immediately asked Zhang Yunqi to carry the girl into the car, started the engine, stepped on the accelerator to the bottom, and drove towards the hospital.

Zhang Yunqi laid Chujian flat on the back seat. The space was small, so he half-knelt and half-crouched in front of Chujian in a strange posture. He took off his T-shirt, and he didn't know where he got so much strength from, but with a "hiss" sound he tore the T-shirt in half. He couldn't pull out the knife, and he didn't dare to press on to stop the bleeding. He put a piece of cloth on each side of the knife, but the blood kept flowing out. He didn't know what to do. He found that he could do nothing now. He could only keep urging the driver to hurry up, but time was as slow as a knife. Anxiety and despair were like a devil clutching his heart. He seemed to have returned to the night many years ago when his father was imprisoned because of him. That 15-year-old boy had only panic and unbearable pain in his heart!

Chu Jian reached out and held his shaking hand: "Yunqi, don't worry, don't worry, I'm fine, listen to me, no matter what happens in the future, don't retaliate against Lin Zihao, just let the police handle it."

Zhang Yunqi nodded: "Okay, you have the final say, I will listen to you in the future."

A smile appeared on Chu Jian's pale little face, calmly but warmly: "If anything happens to me, you have to help me take care of my mother and sister."

Zhang Yunqi shook his head, and kept shaking his head: "This is your business, your business, I can't do it and I can't control it."

Chu Jian reached out and touched Zhang Yunqi's cheek: "Don't be excited, I still have a lot to say to you, Yunqi, you know, I have never dared to tell you that I like you."

Zhang Yunqi tilted his head, holding the torn pieces of clothes and repeatedly sticking them to the sides of the wound, blood staining his shaking hands red: "I don't know, and I don't want to hear it. You can tell me how much you like me tomorrow."

Chu Jian put Zhang Yunqi's bloody hand on her cheek, and smiled with her bloodless lips: "I don't want tomorrow, because I have waited for too long, so long that I almost forgot when I fell in love with you. It's all my fault. I always look back and forth, always afraid of losing. Now I am not afraid anymore, because the degree to which I like you now gives me the courage to tell you that I like you and will always like you."

Zhang Yunqi looked at the girl's moving mouth. The pale face and the blood-red skirt seemed to be a contrast between life and death. A wave of heat rolled under his eyelids. He didn't know how he laughed. His fingernails dug into the flesh, and he used all his strength to make the sound coming out of his throat sound less desperate: "Chu Jian, do you still remember your previous name?"

"Zhao Yu, what's wrong?"

"Yu means light, right?"

"Yes."

"I've heard this before, and I want to tell you now. It says that sometimes, when we love someone in the dark, our love is like the light from a flashlight, shining on that person, making that person a god in your heart. But do you know? Although the light is not on you, you are the light itself."

Zhang Yunqi rested his head against Chu Jian's forehead, held her cold hand and pressed it against his cheek, looked into her smiling eyes, and couldn't hold back his tears any longer, so he just flowed down: "Yu, you are my light."

********
Volume 5. Yu. Final Chapter
End of the volume:

I don't want to spoil it, I don't want to spoil it.

The first meeting will live well.

Please believe me, there is always a rainbow after the storm.

Before writing this volume, I had already thought about writing it this way. If you really read this book carefully, you will find that starting from the title of this volume [Yu], there is a lot of foreshadowing in the text. Eighty percent of the plot revolves around [Yu], from the character's personality and events, such as the heavy rain and traffic jam in Jinping Mining Area, Guiping County, to the Chu Dapeng lottery incident, and Lin Zihao privately bought drinks for the students in Class 156 in the name of Chu Jian (this plot is in Chapter of this volume, and there are readers who mistakenly think that it was Zhang Yunqi who bought it in this chapter. At that time, Zhang Yunqi was in Lijin City, which fully proves that you don't read the book carefully.)
In fact, from the perspective of an author, I have only one goal, which is to reveal the true character of the characters. The true character comes from pressure. Pressure can push characters into increasingly difficult dilemmas, forcing them to make increasingly difficult and adventurous decisions and actions, gradually revealing their true nature, and even approaching their unconscious self, thus reflecting the arc between the characters and the structure. This volume is based on Chu Dapeng's gambling personality and Lin Zihao's extremely strong personality, which triggered a series of subsequent plots and led to the last scene.

Of course, this scene may not be what readers want to see. After all, it is an online novel, and happiness is the key. I can't write a very enjoyable novel, but please rest assured that I will make you happy. If Zhang Yunqi's light makes you cry now, the next volume may be so sweet that it will choke you to death.

Next volume: Thousand Years of Cold.

Update tomorrow.

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(End of this chapter)