CH 3

Posted on February 7, 2016 by yuzamy

Yisheng led her father to a small hotel booked a room for them. After they tidied up their luggage, Yisheng turned to her father, picking up his clothes said, “Dad, you go take a shower first”.

Ye Tianming held his daughter, earnestly looking at her said, “I asked your uncle Song to help me buy our old house back. And as for the money uncle Song owed me some a while back so it won’t be a problem. Us, father and daughter together, we can go back to our old place, what do you say?”

Yisheng withdrew her hand, tuned away appearing to be busy, “Dad do you still think there’s a need for us to stay in this town anymore?”

“Of course there is, although this is still a small town, this is where I first met your mother, got to know to know each other, fell in love with each other and gave birth to you, Yisheng. If it weren’t for me being muddled at that time, then it wouldn’t have….” thinking back at how their family went bankrupt after corruption case, Ye Tianming let down a heavy sigh, lowering his head.

Yisheng walked towards her father, hugging him from the behind, “You shouldn’t think about those things anymore, for six whole years this daughter have been very unfilial to you, haven’t even bothered to visit you. To tell you the truth, at first I too blamed you, but after thinking things through I realized that Dad did all that because of Mom’s illness”

“Hey!” Ye Tianming couldn’t help but laugh at himself, how absurd of him to recall all these sad things again. “Yisheng, don’t you want to stay here?”

“No, I don’t want to” to her this little town held many cruel memories, if she were to stay here again she’ll not be able to return to her peaceful life again”.

“But if father still wish to stay, then you can stay. I’ll go back to B city, it’s fairly close and it would only take two or so hours for one trip from here. And it’s a prefecture level city, so it’ll be easy to find place to work too”.

“Are you really okay with being alone like this?” Ye Tianming’s eyes carried a hint of concern.

Yisheng tried to console him, “My senior is there too. He’s the one  took care of me from back then, helped me a lot too. Also, this time he helped me to take up a internship at there, using his connections. If work hard, I might be able to become a resident there”.

Ye Tianming let out another sigh, patting his daughters hands that weren’t fragile nor delicate as they were once before, a sudden sadness gushed through him.

“Dad, it’s all fine” Yisheng buried her face in his back, faintly closing her eyes, thought about her hazy future, she felt at loss. She couldn’t see it, she couldn’t see the other side, only had her blind beliefs”

As long as I’m alive, it’ll all be fine.

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The means and methods of Song Zheng were quite capable, in no more than three short days he was able to buy back Ye family’s old house. Even Song Zheng himself couldn’t help but laugh, said, “It was nice to talk to the previous owner, he promised to pay seven years of installments too, still really haven’t had such good deal before”.

Ye Tianming looked at the house he didn’t see for six years, also followed in laughing. “To buy this house, like a collection, still same as before”.

Song Zheng  said with a smile, “It was good, to help you take care of this house all these years”

Ye Tianming happily smiled. To live in this old house again, Yisheng  looked around to see traces of herself left there, the eventful days she spent in this house, every corner and every item was deeply engraved in her mind.

Those birthday parties, those fun times, their simple yet exaggerative actions, now it all seemed things that can not put in to words, only leaving behind a taste of pitiful regret. And yet those were, truly the most carefree days of her life.

After few year of remolding it’ll be as father wishes, it almost didn’t have any need to be repaired, except for some changes in furnitures. And so they quickly moved back to the old house, this was not within Yisheng’s expectations at all.

That night, after settling back in her old room, Yisheng received a massage, it was from Song Anchen, “Are you asleep?”

Yisheng replied, “I’m just lying down on the bed”

Then Song Anchen called her. Seeing him calling, she was somewhat hesitant to answer the phone right away. A somewhat (unfamiliar) voice came through, “Hello”

“Still not sleeping? it’s 1 o’clock already” Song Anchen’s voice sounded through the mobile phone. Yisheng blinked, her brain seem to have stopped working for a moment, not sleeping? she’d love to sleep when it’s time to sleep, who’s the one bothering her in the middle of the night. Moreover he took a phone call just to ask this?

“I was sleeping till now, when certain someone’s massage woke me up” Yisheng’s replied in an indifferent tone. Then there was a moment of awkward silence, it took a while before Song Anchen finally said, “Good night, Yisheng”

Yisheng opened her mouth to say something, then closed back again. But she didn’t hang up the phone, neither did he, the awkward silence continued to linger between them. After taking a deep breath to calm herself, Yisheng took the initiative to and hung up first. Curling up on the bed, she closed her eyes.

If it was her from six years ago, then she might’ve took this hind and wouldn’t have hung up on him like that. But now, she must not delude herself such fantasies. Song Anchen and her… was merely childhood friends, nothing more, she didn’t have the freedom for those imaginations anymore.

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Yisheng’s father was somewhat worried to leave his daughter with her senior brother alone, wanted to tag along. But Yisheng denied him, she was no longer the pampered she was once before, those few years of grinding added more experience to her life. Seeing her, appearing so calm and composed, Ye Tianming felt relieved and decided to let her go alone.

Yisheng carried her heavy luggage to station with her, directly went to buy a ticket to the train headed to B city. All she wanted was to leave this place soon, to break away from those painful times.

Yan Heng, Yisheng’s senior brother, they were both on same university but he majored clinical science. She knew him for almost three years. They first met when she was still a freshmen at university, he was already at hi fourth year then. Due to both being from the same hometown, they got to know each other pretty easily.

Yan Heng was very simple and a gentle person. Although they were on different majors, somehow they both understood each other vey well, making them eventually harbor good impressions of each other.

Yisheng was quite introverted and withdrawn back then. By being with her to hear her sorrows, Yan Heng helped her get through the haziest period of her life. So it was only natural for him to know a lot about her, about her life, including Song Anchen. It was quite clear that his concern for her was way past being just her senior. But as for her, she had met with people more caring in her life.

They were merely together for a year, on his fourth year he applied for internship in city B. They only rarely met each other at university, but this distance never had any effect on their relationship, they were still good friends.

Actually Yisheng once suspected that he had feelings for her, but she didn’t dare to make rash assumptions, afraid that it might lead to misunderstandings between them. Fortunately for her, she didn’t bother making guesses that time because he found a girlfriend soon after, which she was really glad to know.

After she got off the train, she carried herself with her heavy luggage, out of the station. Lifting her head up Yisheng’s eyes caught the image of a good looking man, leisurely leaning on a car while smiling at her. Two dimples on each corner of his mouth, slight smile revealing fine line of teeth, familiar figure made her surprised.

He walked up to her saying, “Welcome, my little junior”

“How come you’re here?” I already said I’ll come to find you. Yisheng pushed her luggage, advancing step by step out of the station.

Yan Heng reached out to her, letting out a slight chuckle, lifted her luggage releasing her hand from it. “You were planing to carry all these things all the way to the hospital alone?”

“Like you care!” Yisheng jokingly said, while pouting like a spoiled child, provoking Yan Heng to laugh out loud. “How could I dare to our famous hot-headed little junior”

Yisheng chuckled, slowly following him to the car parked beside the road, After clearly seeing the car he was heading to, she was startled “Ah!” it was an Audi Q7. She stood there staring blankly at him for a while, feeling somewhat stumped for words. Not missing the chance to tease him she said, “Oh, senior’s so rich now, huh? riding on such millions”

Yan Heng only smiled a little, putting her luggage on te trunk, he went to front and opened the door to get in. After starting the car, he turned towards her, “Get in”. Looking at him dazedly, she was startled awake by his voice, while getting on the car she heard him say, “This, my father bought it for me”

Indeed, Yisheng already expected this, he was the son of a high class family after all, they had the economic conditions to supply their son with millions worth houses and vehicles, so as to marry a matching wife. Yan Heng’s family conditions were that good. Yisheng laughed, “It looks like seniors going to marry sister-in-law soon?”

Yan Heng looked distracted for a moment, followed soon after with a light laugh, “I don’t even have a girlfriend, so how am I suppose to get married?”

“Ah! you broke up with sister-in-law?” Yisheng was alarmed.

Yan Heng started the car, stepped on the accelerator, car steadily moved forward. Yan Heng leaned to the side with a smiling expression on his face, “Silly girl, you always take things too seriously, you know your seniors requirements are very high, trying to find the suitable one is not that easy”

Yisheng blinked, staring at him not knowing whether to laugh or cry, was this suppose to be a joke?

Seeing her stare Yan Heng felt a little embarrassed. “Yisheng, what about you? got yourself a boyfriend yet?”

Yisheng withdrew her gaze after a quick glare, “You know me, I’m not heading that way”

“Still for that toy horse?”

Yisheng didn’t reply to him, rather shifted her gaze outside the car, towards the bustling B city. A sub provincial city really is very different, tall buildings rising up one after another, like in a mountain range, mountains raising up one after another.

“I’m transferred to B city’s third affiliated hospital” Yan Heng said while turning to her, “No idea if you also like to go there?”

“Can I really?”

“Well, you’ve got pretty good luck, third hospital renovated all-around, have good amount of capable doctors and attendants to run around, and they directly agreed for the internship after going through your profile” Yan Heng suddenly winked at her saying, “Or maybe it’s just that I have a great charisma”

“Cocky!” Yisheng sneered. She felt really happy, she didn’t expect for everything to turn out so well, perhaps heavens are helping her.

Yan Heng stopped the car beside a community, then two got out of the car, heading towards a house.

“This is the one, it has a annual rent, I paid for the first year, you’ll have to figure things out for later ones”

Yisheng gathered her hands in gratitude, “Senior is really a very capable adult”

Yan Heng reached out to scratch her head out of habit, “You… ah”

Yisheng gently chuckled, appearing extremely silly. There was hint of tenderness in Yan Heng’s eyes when he looked at her. He only wanted for her to be happy, from the moment he first saw that petite and frail person, slowly walking step by step, dragging that heavy luggage with her, until now he always wished for her to be happy and just like then step by step to forget the fact that he was her senior, only as this senior.