Chapter 63: Tell You
Gu Ruoyan looked at me pitifully and expectantly like a helpless child. I knew there was no other meaning in her words, she was just afraid of loneliness and hoped that someone could accompany her and not let her feel so lonely.
I sighed in my heart. Although it was inconvenient and inappropriate for a man and a woman to be in the same room, I felt sorry for her when I saw how pitiful she was. I couldn't bear to just walk away and ignore her.
I hesitated for a moment and was about to speak. Gu Ruoyan suddenly covered her mouth with her hands, pretending to vomit. But she failed to vomit the first time, and immediately struggled to get out of bed and ran to the bathroom. As soon as she rushed in, she finally vomited for the second time. I heard the sound of vomiting in the bathroom and Gu Ruoyan's extremely sad panting.
I was worried, so I followed her into the bathroom, and saw Gu Ruoyan lying on her knees at the toilet, still retching. I immediately took a towel from the wall, soaked it with water, and handed it to her, while patting her back with my left hand to make her feel more comfortable.
Gu Ruoyan vomited for a while, but she didn't vomit much, just a lot of pungent acid. It seemed that she didn't eat dinner, but just drank there. She finally couldn't vomit anything anymore, and sat down on the ground weakly, leaning against the bathtub and breathing heavily. I had to use a towel to wipe off the tears, snot and dirt on her face after vomiting, and asked her again: "Manager, how do you feel now? Are you feeling better?"
Gu Ruoyan did not answer, but her chest rose and fell sharply, and it was obvious that her body was still churning and she was in great discomfort. However, after vomiting, her consciousness was much clearer. She reached out to take the towel, turned it over, pushed away her glasses and wiped her eyes.
I asked again: "Are you feeling better? Do you want me to help you back to bed?"
Gu Ruoyan glanced at me, nodded and said, "Wait a minute!" Then he blew his nose vigorously with a towel. He blew his nose again and wiped it again. The towel was so dirty that it was unusable.
Gu Ruoyan threw the towel aside. Her straight nose turned red due to the force, but her breathing began to return to normal. I placed my hands under her armpits and asked again, "Are you okay?"
Gu Ruoyan smiled apologetically, and used her left hand to support herself, trying to get up. I hurriedly put more strength on her, lifted her up from the ground, and supported her back to the bed.
It seemed that all of Gu Ruoyan's strength had disappeared with the vomiting just now. She lay limply on the bed and closed her eyes to rest. I grabbed the water cup beside the bed and said, "Drink some water to rinse your mouth. After vomiting for a while, your mouth must be very bitter, right?"
Gu Ruoyan opened her eyes, and she hummed again, trying to raise her upper body to drink water. Seeing how weak she was, I held the water cup with one hand, stretched out the other hand to support her back , and fed her three large gulps of water.
After drinking the boiled water, Gu Ruoyan seemed to feel much better. She took her lips away from the cup, looked at me with gratitude, and said softly, "Thank you, Tang Qian! I feel much better now."
I put down the water cup and saw that she seemed to have really sobered up, so I asked, "You have been drinking outside until dawn these past few nights and have never come home?"
Gu Ruoyan turned her eyes away, and her painful and miserable expression was obvious. She was silent for a long time before she said, "Not every night. Sometimes I stay in the office all night and don't go anywhere."
I nodded and continued, "Are you going to give up on yourself and numb yourself with alcohol all day long for the rest of your life? Do you know that if you continue like this, your life, career and even health will be ruined by yourself. The decision to divorce was made by you. Since you would be so miserable, why did you agree to divorce your husband in the first place? Since you have chosen to divorce, you must cheer up, work hard to get rid of your husband's shadow, and find happiness for yourself. And now you act like you are in agony and living a life of drunkenness and dreams all day long. Do you think your husband will sympathize with you? No! That kind of unfaithful person will only laugh at you, and others who don't know the situation will only look down on you. What's the point of living like this?"
Gu Ruoyan's eyes were reddened by what I said, and she was about to cry. She lowered her head and sniffed hard. After I scolded her, I felt that I was a little too harsh. She was not my relative, and I didn't seem to have the right to say that to her.
But I was still very angry. When I was not talking, I habitually took out a cigarette and lit it. But I just took a puff, and Gu Ruoyan raised her head, stretched out her hand to snatch the cigarette from my mouth, put it in her mouth and smoked it fiercely. I was stunned and thought: Great! Now she is drinking and smoking again, who knows how she will torture herself in the future. This woman is good in everything, but she will keep everything in her heart and never tell anyone. She also likes to abuse herself, making herself look like neither a human nor a ghost.
I was speechless. I silently took out another cigarette, lit it and started smoking. The two of us sat facing each other in silence for a long time. The only sound was the cigarette's exhalation.
To break the silence between us, I asked her, "Why did your phone suddenly disconnect just now? I couldn't get through no matter how I called later. I seem to remember that you screamed at the end, and I thought something happened to you. I was so scared that I ran over here, but when I got here I found that you were fine. I was so scared that I broke out in a cold sweat. What happened?"
Gu Ruoyan flicked the ash from her cigarette and sighed, "You are the only one who cares about me now. Apart from you, I don't have any other trustworthy friends around me. I, Gu Ruoyan, am such a failure to have lived to this point. Alas!"
She paused for a moment and continued, "When I was talking to you on the phone just now, there was a fight next to me. Someone picked up a bottle and threw it at me. It fell right at my feet and broke into pieces. I was startled and my phone fell to the ground and broke."
I said "Oh" and understood. "How do you feel now? Are you still sad after vomiting?" Gu Ruoyan said, "I feel much more awake after vomiting, but my head still hurts, and I feel dizzy and uncomfortable."
I said, "Then you should go to bed early and stop drinking all the time. It's not good for your health to drink until you are drunk every time. If you feel lonely, you can call me to chat. I will come to accompany you when I am free. The most important thing is that you must cheer up, forget those unpleasant memories, and live a happy life again. I suggest you go out for a trip for a while, change your mood, enjoy the beautiful mountains and rivers of the motherland, or simply go abroad to appreciate the exotic customs, which can quickly free people from pain. Maybe after you come back, you have forgotten your troubles and become very happy!"
Gu Ruoyan, who was smoking, chuckled when she heard this, but was choked by the thick smoke. She coughed loudly and laughed, "Ahem... it's easy to say, ahem... ahem, do you think you can forget it just by ahem... you say forget it? If you can forget your troubles by going on a trip, then no one in this world will suffer!"
I said, "Great! You finally laughed. Look, aren't you happier when you laugh than when you cry? That's right. Sometimes you can be happy by not thinking about unpleasant things."
Gu Ruoyan smiled bitterly and shook her head, saying, "Alright, alright, I understand what you mean. I will try to learn to forget. Don't worry about me. Aren't you leaving? Then go quickly and don't disturb my rest!"
I said "Ah", threw away the cigarette butt, stood up and said, "Then I'll be leaving first. If you need any help, just call me on my cell phone. Go to bed early."
I helped her pull the quilt over her, but I didn't dare to help her take off her clothes. I smiled at her and turned to walk to the door.
I just opened the door when I heard Gu Ruoyan calling me, "Tang Qian!"
I turned around and asked in surprise, "What's the matter?"
I saw three parts of fear, three parts of embarrassment, three parts of loneliness and one part of reluctance on Gu Ruoyan's face. She opened her mouth and uttered a sentence after a long time: "Can you... wait until I fall asleep before leaving? I'm afraid I won't be able to sleep if I'm alone here."
I understand her heart. Although Gu Ruoyan has been alone in an empty house for a long time, she still had hope at that time. She hoped that her husband would come back and change his mind. So although the days were sad, they were not difficult to endure. But since the divorce, endless emptiness has come to her, and no one will accompany her in the long nights. The loneliness will be ten times stronger than before, and the unbearable taste will be ten times more painful than usual. So she would rather get drunk outside and sit in the office until dawn than go home.
I felt both sympathy and helplessness, so I sighed twice and closed the door. I walked back to the bed and said, "Okay, I'll wait until you fall asleep before I leave."
Gu Ruoyan smiled, and immediately took off her shoes and socks and slept in the quilt. I dragged a chair over and sat down beside her bed, saying, "Close your eyes and go to sleep. I'll sit here."
Gu Ruoyan hummed and began to take off her outer clothes under the quilt. After a while, she took them out and threw them on the corner of the bed. Then she rested her head on one of her hands, looked at me and asked, "By the way, aren't you going to tell me the reason why you resigned? Then tell me now. If it's not very interesting, I might fall asleep while listening."
I smiled and said, "I'm not telling you a story. Besides, you're not a child anymore. Do you still need an adult to tell you a story while you're coaxing you to sleep?"
Gu Ruoyan seemed very peaceful. She slept in bed, and she felt very satisfied with having a man beside her to talk to. She had a smile on her face and joked with me: "From your tone, it seems that you often tell stories to your children while putting them to sleep. Do you have children already?"
I said, "I don't have any children, but I have a sister who is nine years younger than me. When she was little, she would never close her eyes before going to bed without hearing a story. I'm the older brother, so I have to tell the hypnotic stories most of the time. So I'm pretty good at telling stories!"
Gu Ruoyan said: "Then you two must have a very good relationship as siblings, right?"
"Not bad!"
"Tang Qian, you are so lucky to have a family!"
I was silent for a moment. In my daily work, I gradually learned that Gu Ruoyan lost her father at the age of 14, and her mother died of illness when she was 20. After graduating from college, she came to this city alone to work, and after marrying her husband, she never had children. It can be said that in this place, except for her husband, she has no relatives. Now that even her only relative has left her, it is no wonder that she is discouraged and lazy all day long, and drinks to drown her sorrows.
I also thought of myself complaining about being looked down upon by others because of my poverty, which made me feel resentful and hateful towards the rich. I thought that I was not appreciated for my talent and that God treated me unfairly, so I was extremely depressed. In fact, compared to many people, I am much happier! I am healthy, well-fed, well-clothed, my parents are alive, my family is harmonious, and I have a girlfriend who loves me. If a person is like this, what else can he ask for! But sometimes fate likes to play jokes, and will constantly arrange some small misunderstandings and small disturbances, so that you can't help but change your thoughts and actions. For example, if I quit my job, if there hadn't been that series of disturbances and misunderstandings, I don't think I would have changed so much, right?
I sighed softly and took out another cigarette.
Seeing me sighing in silence, Gu Ruoyan whispered, "Did I say something wrong? I can see you're not very happy."
I took a puff of cigarette and smiled, "No, I just remembered some things that I couldn't control, and I felt a little emotional."
Gu Ruoyan asked: "Does it have anything to do with your resignation?"
I was amazed at her quick judgment and accurate intuition. No wonder she could be a sales manager while I couldn't. This woman is really extraordinary. Although she was at a low point in her relationship, her mind was still very sharp!
I said, “Yes, it’s somewhat related.”
"Then tell me what you have to say. If I am awake, I can give you some advice."
I smoked and thought for a while, and I decided to tell her all my secrets without reservation. Sometimes people keep secrets or worries in their hearts for too long, which will add a heavy burden to their hearts and is very bad for themselves. So everyone needs a friend to confide in. This friend does not have to be the best, but he must be the most reliable and safest.
Gu Ruoyan is the most suitable person for me to confide in right now. First, she is steady and reliable, even a little cold and indifferent, and will not spread my affairs. Second, she also has a secret that I know, and we happen to have some sympathy. Third, she has nothing to do with what I have done, so I can tell her everything without any scruples. Fourth, I trust her and think she is a good person.
Halfway through a cigarette, I finally spoke, "My reason is very complicated. If you want to understand, you must listen to me from the beginning. If I start from the beginning, it will be a long story, and you may fall asleep out of boredom after listening to half of it."
Gu Ruoyan wrapped her entire body in the quilt, with only her head sticking out. She said, "It's okay. I want to listen. Go turn off the main lights and leave only the bedside lamp on. Talk slowly. If I really fall asleep, then you can continue to talk to me tomorrow night when I go to bed."
