"The paper in the bathroom is used up, I need to get so new ones." Shen Jianian said, suddenly feeling the atmosphere was unusual and tentatively asked, "I seed to hear you talking loudly with Ah Che, did you have a fight?"
Although she said this, Shen Jianian didn’t believe they would actually fight; Ah Che is gentle by nature, and Xiaxia isn’t soone who fusses over small matters.
Bai Changxia steadied her emotions, pressing her hand on her forehead and rubbing it, she said gently, "We didn’t fight, I just unconsciously raised my voice when I got emotional."
She explained to Shen Jianian and said coldly to Pei Che on the phone, "That’s it then."
Before Pei Che could say anything else, Bai Changxia hung up and handed the phone back to Shen Jianian. She went to the room to get a roll of paper and placed it in the bathroom.
"Do you want a midnight snack?" Bai Changxia asked as she ca out.
Shen Jianian didn’t stand on ceremony with her: "I’m actually a bit hungry."
Bai Changxia laughed, picked up her phone, ordered takeout, and added a bunch of junk food in a parent’s eye to the cart, placing the order together.
After waiting over half an hour, the takeout arrived. Bai Changxia was on the balcony collecting clothes, so Shen Jianian went to open the door. She looked through the peephole first to confirm it was a delivery guy in uniform before opening the door.
Bai Changxia ordered quite a bit, including barbecue, fried noodles, marinated dishes, along with so beers and soft drinks.
After locking the door, Shen Jianian carried the items and placed them on the coffee table.
Bai Changxia carried a few clothing items into the bedroom, threw them onto the sofa in one go, not bothering to fold them. She walked out while tying her long hair with a hair tie she took off her wrist and plopped down onto the carpet by the coffee table.
Bai Changxia: "I also ordered pizza, has it arrived?"
"I didn’t see it." Shen Jianian opened all the food containers, the living room was filled with the fragrant sll of street food, full of a lively atmosphere.
As soon as she finished speaking, the doorbell rang again. This ti, Bai Changxia went to open the door, bringing in a box of pizza.
Shen Jianian glanced at the size of the pizza and couldn’t help but be surprised: "Ordering this much, just the two of us, can we finish it?"
Bai Changxia sat back down with her knees bent, glanced over the food piled on the coffee table, and laughed, "It is a lot. I haven’t eaten with you for a while, I wanted to order everything, and unknowingly ordered too much."
She popped open a can of beer and took out a bottle of orange juice for Shen Jianian from the plastic bag.
"I’ll have beer too." Shen Jianian requested.
No reason for Bai Changxia to drink alone.
"Oh co on, with your low tolerance for alcohol." Bai Changxia teased her.
"It doesn’t matter, getting drunk just ans I’ll sleep it off."
"Are you sure you want to drink?"
Shen Jianian reached out to Bai Changxia with a serious look, not seeming to be joking. So Bai Changxia relented, handing her the beer she just opened and opened another for herself.
They put on disposable gloves, eating as they chatted, with most of the questions coming from Bai Changxia and Shen Jianian answering, summarizing her experiences over the past three years, omitting much of the painful parts. Bai Changxia couldn’t help but secretly wipe away her tears a few tis. Shen Jianian sitting beside her smiled and Bai Changxia clumsily said the marinated dishes were too spicy, making her want to cry.
Shen Jianian squinted her eyes slightly, her gaze drifting as she repeated, "It’s all in the past, it’s all in the past..."
The hardest days have beco mories; there’s nothing she’s unsatisfied with now. If there is sothing, it’s her wish to recover the lost mory.
If it’s truly irretrievable, so be it. As Doctor Zhang said, compared to those who suffer from diseases that never heal, losing mory is a fortunate outco.
One shouldn’t be too greedy.
Bai Changxia, whose drinking capacity was quite good, was still clear-headed, digesting what Shen Jianian told her, slowly growing a sense of guilt. Perhaps she had been too harsh with Pei Che; these past three years, he was the one who stayed by Jianian’s side, guiding her through rehabilitation, taking her abroad for surgery, healing both her body and soul, giving her a chance to be reborn.
He did so much; even Shen Jianian herself believed without Pei Che, she wouldn’t be who she is now. More accurately, if it weren’t for Pei Che, she might not be alive.
Bai Changxia removed her disposable gloves, hugged her knees, leaned against the edge of the sofa, and after a full three minutes of silence, asked Shen Jianian, "Do you like Pei Che?"
Shen Jianian propped her chin, seemingly not understanding why she suddenly asked this but answered seriously, "Of course I like him. You’ve known this for a long ti, haven’t you? I’ve relied on him since I was a child. As I grew up, at the age when I realized what liking soone ant, my eyes and heart were full of him. Back then, I imagined I would marry him one day."
As soone who knows the truth, Bai Changxia felt sowhat uncomfortable hearing this.
"Jianian." Bai Changxia called Shen Jianian. When her gaze turned, Bai Changxia didn’t know how to speak, repeatedly considering her words, finally using a hypothetical tone, "I heard from Pei Che that after your car accident you lost so mories. If, just if, you happened to fall for soone else during that ti, but you don’t rember now, would you still marry Pei Che?"
Unable to bring up anything related to the Fu Family, this was the only way to probe Jianian’s true feelings.
Shen Jianian’s mind worked slowly and didn’t grasp her aning: "How could I like soone else?"
Bai Changxia didn’t argue with her, choosing instead to go along: "That’s why I said it’s a hypothetical situation. Try thinking if you fell in love with another man, lost your mory and forgot him, but only rember Pei Che, would you still marry Pei Che?"
Shen Jianian spoke truthfully: "I can’t imagine it."
She’d never considered that she would love soone else. When Pei Che went abroad to study, she promised to wait for him at ho, and he said he would co back to marry her.
So things happened in between, which caused the original plan to be delayed until now.
Bai Changxia took a large gulp of beer, pressing one hand on her forehead, discouraged. People truly can’t imagine things beyond their perception. In Jianian’s view, she only likes Pei Che. She entirely forgot Fu Jichen; of course, she couldn’t conjure up such a person and imagine a passionate love affair out of thin air.
"No more talking, let’s sleep."
Bai Changxia tossed the empty beer can into the trash, tidied up the coffee table a bit, and helped the groggy Shen Jianian up, leading her to the bedroom.
She took a nightgown and so clean, unworn underwear from the closet, handing them to Shen Jianian: "You wash up first, and call if you need anything."
After Shen Jianian showered and collapsed onto the big bed with striped sheets, her face pressed into the pillow, blinking and unable to sleep.
When Bai Changxia ca out of the bathroom and saw she was still awake, she asked, "Not sleepy?"
Shen Jianian was on her phone, the internet flooded with reports about tonight’s Yan Qiusheng concert, stating reliably that his coback was to fulfill his mother’s last wishes.
"Seeing Master Yan Qiusheng once is quite rare. I almost impulsively rushed backstage to ask for his autograph tonight, good thing I didn’t." Shen Jianian said, "The news reports say his mother passed away three months ago, no wonder he was extra quiet at the concert’s start."
Bai Changxia dried her wet hair and said casually, "If you want to see him, it shouldn’t be hard, he’s your teacher, just a phone call away. Besides, he’s quite worried about you."
Shen Jianian raised her head from the pillow, looking at Bai Changxia with puzzled eyes: "Who are you saying is whose teacher?"
Bai Changxia paused mid-air with the towel, astonishnt in her eyes; she thought, surely not, had Shen Jianian forgotten entirely that she once apprenticed under Yan Qiusheng?
Opening her mouth, Bai Changxia didn’t know how to tell her.
Shen Jianian kept waiting for her answer, but when Bai Changxia didn’t speak, she had to follow up, "You just said Yan Qiusheng is my teacher and worried about ?" She shouldn’t have misheard.
Bai Changxia wrapped her wet hair in the towel, sat by the bed, eyes fixed on Shen Jianian’s face, not wanting to hide everything from her: "It’s like that."
"How is that possible?!" Shen Jianian flipped upright, pointing at herself, her drunk eyes wide open, seeking confirmation from Bai Changxia, "Are you sure you weren’t mistaken? That’s Yan Qiusheng, a world-class cellist; how could he be my teacher? He doesn’t take students."
Bai Changxia said, "He indeed doesn’t take students, so I don’t know why he agreed to take you on back then, but you are indeed his only disciple. If you don’t believe , I have his contact info, do you want to call him now to confirm?"
As for why Yan Qiusheng took Jianian as a student, Bai Changxia hadn’t asked Jianian about it before, and Jianian never specifically ntioned it in front of her; she didn’t know the details.
She suspected it might be related to Fu Jichen. After all, there was nothing that man couldn’t achieve.
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