Chapter 4 Your Heart Is Out of Reach 04
I rushed to the place Xue Ye mentioned, which was a billiard room converted from a factory. The interior was simply decorated, with gray cement walls on all sides, various graffiti sprayed on the walls, glaring headlights hanging above, and rows of oil barrels repainted in colorful colors stacked in the corners.
At a glance, I saw Xue Ye holding a cigarette, wearing a black vest and jacket, sitting at a pool table, playing cards and drinking beer with a group of people.
It was so noisy inside that no one noticed I came in.
"Xue Ye!" I yelled in exasperation, and the originally noisy billiard room immediately became quiet.
Everyone's eyes were focused on me. I saw Xue Ye turned his head with the cards in both hands. When his eyes saw me, the cigarette in his mouth fell out with a puff.
I didn't have time to consider other people's gazes, nor did I think that this was his territory. I walked up to him like a ghost who came to take my life, furious, and asked in a stern voice, "Where is he?"
Xue Ye must have been interested in my abnormal attitude. He crumpled the cards into a ball and smiled at me. But there was a storm of anger in his smile: "Hey, so fierce, who is he to you?"
"Lover?" Xue Ye glanced at the crowd. Someone whistled, and the unbearable sounds of speculation and ambiguous laughter pierced my ears.
I suppressed my anger, looked at him steadily, and squeezed out the answer I wanted through my teeth: "I asked you where the person is?"
He smiled and said, "No."
"I ask you, where are they?" I looked at him stubbornly.
"I say it again, no." Xue Ye seemed to be irritated by me. His smiling eyes were no longer clear, but looked at me provocatively.
“Say it again!” Unprecedented anger, rage, and despair all poured into my body, almost devouring my remaining sanity.
"I said no--" Xue Ye raised his voice, but the tail end of the tone was drowned out by the sound of "pop" and the screams of the crowd.
I don’t know what happened to Lin Jiaxuan, but my heart sank when I thought that he might have fallen into the hands of these guys.
I was so worried about the boy's safety that I even forgot to ask, why is he here? What did you call me for? I had a preconceived notion that they had hurt him.
Xue Ye looked at me and I looked at him. Scarlet blood flowed down his forehead like reptiles, dyeing his eyebrows, his eyes, and his lips red.
He slowly lowered his head, looking at the bottle in my hand with eyes of disbelief, as if he couldn't believe that this man, who was shorter than him, weaker and less courageous than him, dared to hit him on his territory.
I held the remaining half of the beer bottle in front of him and spoke clearly, word by word: "I'll ask again, where is Lin Jiaxuan?"
The crowd was quiet for three seconds, then exploded. The noisy sounds instantly filled the surroundings, some people were booing, some were cheering.
Two men with tattoos on their arms saw Xue Ye being hit, and immediately put down their pool cues and tried to rush towards me. Xue Ye winked at them, telling them to mind their own business.
Someone handed Xue Ye a towel to treat his wound, but Xue Ye wiped the blood and said forget it. I waited for him to lose his temper or even hit me.
Just as I could gradually feel my wrists being scratched by the glass fragments and the fine and dense pain spreading from my wrists, Xue Ye looked at me and smiled as if he was having an epileptic seizure.
"Girl, you really surprised me, you're so hot!" He seemed to have discovered something incredible, and laughed like a madman. He wiped the blood off his forehead, came over and snatched the half-broken bottle from my hand, and exhaled, "Does your hand hurt?"
He held my hand and looked at it over and over again: "Fortunately, it's just a little skin breakage. A bowl of pig blood meatballs will heal it."
At this time, I saw Lin Jiaxuan standing behind the crowd. He was wearing a coat with bare arms underneath. His head and chest were wrapped in layers of gauze. He was watching this farce between Xue Ye and me.
"Lin Jiaxuan, are you okay?" I pulled my hand free from Xue Ye's grasp and rushed over to check his injuries. Lin Jiaxuan's eyes were fixed on Xue Ye .
"What on earth did they do to you?" I was so anxious that I almost cried. I wanted to see how badly he was injured but was afraid to touch his wounds.
"I'm fine." He answered me coldly.
"Wow, so cool—" Xue Ye looked at Lin Jiaxuan with disdain, jumped down from the edge of the pool table, walked in front of us, and laughed contemptuously, "Boy, brother teaches you, if the little sparrow's wings haven't grown, don't mess with the eagle, otherwise no one will know how you died."
"What did you say!" Lin Jiaxuan rushed forward to argue, but I held him back and told him not to argue with the gangster.
"Hey, you still don't accept it? If we brothers hadn't saved you today, would you be able to stand here and talk to me?" Xue Ye said , not even looking at Lin Jiaxuan.
Lin Jiaxuan said nothing. He clenched his fists, held back his ruthlessness, and swore fiercely: "One day, one day..."
Xue Ye glanced at me, pointed at the cut on his head, and said to me in a tone like he was asking for a debt: "Here, you have to pay me back."
After saying that, he called his friends over and continued playing cards at the pool table, as if nothing had happened.
I helped Lin Jiaxuan back home. He insisted on not going to the hospital and his face looked terribly gloomy all the way.
Later, I learned from Xue Ye that Lin Jiaxuan had a fight with a group of thugs that day and almost lost his life. Those thugs had a background in loan sharking, and one of the thugs was Jin Li's boyfriend. Lin Jiaxuan was beaten half to death when he was caught by Xue Ye and his friends. The man in the orange jacket took Lin Jiaxuan's phone and found my photo in it. Knowing that he knew me, they saved Lin Jiaxuan's life.
I don't know where Lin Jiaxuan heard about Jin Li, just as I didn't know that before going to "D Major", the piece of waste paper with the clue written on it that July threw into the trash can was picked up by Zhuang Nan. Zhuang Nan, who has always had a good relationship with Lin Jiaxuan, told Lin Jiaxuan everything about July's whereabouts and investigation.
After sending Lin Jiaxuan to his residence , I stood at the street corner where I could see him from afar. I watched him grab his hair and cry his heart out under the night sky.
It is a hatred for fragility and insignificance, and a helpless expression for not being able to protect the ones you love.
Once a person has something he wants to protect, he will work hard to become stronger. Lin Jiaxuan wants to quickly grow into a man who can protect July from the wind and rain.
In order to become such a person, Lin Jiaxuan learned to depend on others and embarked on a path of his own choice. That path was destined to be bumpy, but he was willing to pay any price to have a strong arm.
That road doesn't include me.
Lin Jiaxuan's life has chosen this path for July, and we are destined to drift apart.
Once you take that step, there’s no going back.
Life didn't change much after I returned to school, except that I only saw Lin Jiaxuan a few times. We seemed to have gradually faded out of each other's lives.
My mother's condition became worse, and Shen Huai rented a small house next to the hospital to take care of her. The doctor called Shen Huai and me into the office more than once to tell us that my mother was not suitable for having children.
Shen Huai tried several times to persuade his mother to give up the child, but when he saw his mother caressing her belly with loving eyes and speaking softly, he turned his back and his eyes became red.
July called me and asked me why I suddenly ran away that day. I made the excuse that my mother had something to ask me at the hospital and did not tell her about Lin Jiaxuan.
Later, I told July the story about my family.
So, July came to the hospital to visit her mother with a fruit basket, and also brought a bunch of brand new clothes and shoes, all of which were made by Grandma Zhuang herself before she passed away.
Seeing that cleanly washed centenary dress made me feel inexplicably sad.
After class in the afternoon, I went to the hospital to see my mother and found that July had come again. When I went there, I happened to see her and her mother chatting. When I saw them snuggling together and discussing what name to give the child, my heart was so warm that only tears were left.
I thought of the unborn child in July.
She is a woman who can amaze time, imprisoned in the quagmire of reality. She has both the brilliance of a phoenix reborn from the ashes, and the elegance of a camellia that is untainted by dirt.
"Girl, what are you thinking about?" A finger poked my cheek, and July stuffed a peeled orange slice into my mouth.
"I wonder why you are so beautiful." I teased.
"Since I am so beautiful, would I have the honor to invite Miss Fang to have a nice meal?" She started to speak in a frivolous way.
"OK."
