Ji Hang didn't knock on the door for a while and I thought she had left.
Sun Yu lay on the bed, playing with his phone, as if nothing had happened, with white earphones in his ears. Tang Yu also returned to his bed, eating and reading a novel.
I quietly packed my luggage and found a bottle of disinfectant to disinfect the scratches on my palms. During this time, Sun Yu looked up at me and said nothing, and I didn't explain to her.
After I finished packing all my things, I didn't see He Yiran and Wang Hong come back. I guess they went out to buy things.
I walked out of the dormitory with the garbage bag and was surprised to find someone sitting at the door. It was Ji Hang who had not left yet.
Ji Hang was holding a bottle of mineral water in her hand, drinking it sip by sip. The girls on the same floor who passed by here would look at her in surprise and whisper about something.
Ji Hang also saw me and smiled at me with her head tilted. I tightened my grip on the garbage bag and was about to leave, but she grabbed my trouser leg and said pitifully, "Can you lend me a few dollars? I want to buy a loaf of bread. I'm hungry."
Thinking about her, and then thinking about Sun Yu lying on the bed, I sighed helplessly, my heart softened, and I said, "Let's go, I'll treat you to dinner."
When Ji Hang heard this, an expression of surprise immediately appeared on his face. He quickly got up from the ground and smiled at me ingratiatingly.
I carried the garbage bag and led her to the stairs. When I was leaving, I saw Sun Yu, who was lying on the bed, standing at the door with a gloomy face. He glared at both of us fiercely and closed the door forcefully.
Looking at the closed door, Ji Hang stuck out his tongue and said with a smile: "She doesn't like me, but you still take me out to dinner. She must be even more resentful of you."
I looked at Ji Hang, who was still able to smile despite his difficult situation, and smiled bitterly, saying indifferently, "It's okay. We'll be going home tomorrow anyway. We'll be divided into different classes next semester. She chose the arts and I chose the science. We're not together, so we won't meet each other."
Ji Hang said "Oh" lightly, and then, as if she was afraid that I would shake her off, she hurriedly grabbed the corner of my clothes and asked me again with a smile: "What are you treating me to?"
“Three dishes and one soup.”
We had lunch in the school cafeteria. Ji Hang was extremely hungry and was not picky at all. He ate faster than me.
Seeing that she was choking while eating, I bought her another bottle of drink and watched her eat.
Ji Hang added another small bowl of rice to himself and ate it slowly along with the braised fish.
"Your name is Jian Lening?" She was chewing rice and speaking unclearly.
I said "hmm" and pushed the seaweed egg soup towards her.
"Don't you get along well with Sun Yu?" After leaving the dormitory, Ji Hang no longer called Sun Yu "sister".
"We used to get along well, but then there were some misunderstandings." I answered truthfully, took a sip of Coke, and didn't say anything else.
Ji Hang smiled knowingly and said, "It's because of Xu Yan, right? Don't take that matter too seriously. She is just being too picky."
I listened to Ji Hang's constant chattering silently, and looked around the cafeteria from time to time. There were not many people eating here today, probably because they could go home tomorrow, so many people excitedly ran to the restaurants outside the school to eat.
As it was getting dark outside, Ji Hang was finally full and she wiped her mouth with satisfaction.
Seeing her drinking soda leisurely, I couldn't help but ask, "What are you going to do now? Do you want to call your dad again?"
"His phone is out of service, probably he's on a business trip again. It doesn't matter, I'll stay at my friend's place for a night, if that doesn't work , I can go home. My mom is gone, but the house is still there!"
"Besides your father's cell phone number, don't you have any other contact information for him?"
"If there was, I wouldn't come here to look for Sun Yu! My dad said that my family doesn't like me and my mom, so they didn't give us their home phone number." Ji Hang said with a sneer.
"Where are your mother's relatives? If you can't get in touch with your father, you'll have to rely on an elder! How can you survive on your own when you don't even have money for food?"
I don't know why I was worried about Ji Hang. I always felt that she seemed indifferent and was a bit pitiful in my initial impression .
"How could my mom have any relatives? My grandparents were so angry that they cut off relations with my mom because she insisted on being with my dad. Over the past decade, my mom and I have been the only ones depending on each other. Oh, no, my dad also comes to see us occasionally. When I was young, I didn't know much and thought I was just like other children, with parents and my own family. Later, when I became sensible, I realized that my dad was not mine alone. In addition, in the eyes of others, only Sun Yu is her father's child, and I am an illegitimate daughter who cannot be seen in public. My mom didn't complain at first, but after being discriminated against for a long time, she doesn't say it, but I know she still has some resentment in her heart, otherwise she wouldn't abandon me and walk away. I don't think my dad would leave me alone, so my mom left to pursue her own happiness, and I'm very happy for her."
"If you are really happy, then why are you crying now?" Looking at Ji Hang who was desperately wiping his tears, I couldn't help but ask.
Ji Hang replied stubbornly: "Understanding and sadness are two different things. I can understand why my mother left me, but now I have no mother, so it is normal for me to be sad. If my father doesn't want me, wouldn't I become an orphan without a father or a mother? I can't even imagine it. What should I do if my father doesn't want me?"
Ji Hang sniffed and cried to me. Everyone in the cafeteria looked at us curiously.
I sat quietly aside, listening to Ji Hang's nagging complaints to a stranger like me. Ji Hang was sitting in front of me, but another crying girl appeared in my mind.
I still remember one night after I broke my foot , Sun Yu, just like Ji Hang now, cried to me helplessly like a child who was afraid of being abandoned.
She said, Jian Lening, what if my dad wants Ji Hang and not me? What if my dad chooses Ji Hang? What should I do if he abandons me like he abandoned my mom? Jian Lening, I feel so bad!
God knows, I actually remembered her words so clearly, not missing a single word.
Because I think if a person is willing to cry to you and tell you very private things, it means that she trusts you very much, and you should not let her down.
But now I think about it, maybe I am the only one who thinks that night is very important. What I cherish may not be cherished by others.
Sun Yu once cried and said, what if her father didn't want her and went to Ji Hang, but now, Ji Hang cried and told me, what if her father didn't want her anymore.
In fact, these two girls who have been competing for their father's love are just too afraid of losing this love.
Not only them, every child who lacks love is like this. They are particularly nervous because they are afraid of losing.
Back then, I couldn’t find any words to comfort the sad Sun Yu, and now, I also can’t find any words to comfort the crying Ji Hang.
I felt sad for Sun Yu that night, and I feel sad for Ji Hang now, but I have always been a bystander in their complicated family relationships and should not express my opinions, because the person who can solve all the problems is not me, but the father whom they all don't want to lose.
I think love is mutual. Sun Yu and Ji Hang couldn't bear to lose their father. Obviously, they both loved that man. Naturally, their father should love them the same way, otherwise they wouldn't love him so much. So that adult should arrange their future.
After chatting with me for a while, Ji Hang received a call from her friend. Just like when she came, she said goodbye to me with a smile and said she was going to her friend's place.
This was the first time I met Ji Hang and also the last time I saw her.
Whether it is Ji Hang, Sun Yu, or Tang Yu, they are just passers-by in my life. We met because of certain things, and separated because of certain things. The traces of varying depths left in my life will eventually disappear in the tide of time.
Maybe I'm not a good listener. I don't even know what happened to Ji Hang later, and whether Sun Yu accepted Ji Hang as his sister.
All I know is that I had a complete break with Sun Yu and the others that night, and we went our separate ways afterwards.
We were in the same school but not in the same class. Our two intersecting lines slowly changed into two parallel lines and we became insignificant passers-by on each other's growth paths.
The winter night was really cold. The cold wind blew into my collar. I shivered and walked towards the dormitory.
I just came out to take out the trash, so I didn't bring my key. Now when I went back, I found the door was closed, so I had no choice but to knock on it.
Although it was dark outside, it was still early, just a little after seven, and the lights in the dormitory were still on. No one would go to bed so early, but I knocked on the door for a long time and no one came to open it.
I knew there were people inside, but they just didn't want to open the door for me.
Someone in the dormitory next door opened the door to see who it was because I knocked. When they saw that I was locked outside, those girls had surprised expressions on their faces and someone walked towards me.
"What's wrong? Didn't you bring your key? Is there no one in your dormitory?"
After coming to this school, I seldom interact with people, so I am not as familiar with the people in the next dormitory as Tang Yu and the others.
Seeing someone coming, I withdrew my hand from knocking on the door and replied stiffly: "Well, I didn't bring the key when I came out."
"Isn't there someone in your dormitory? I just ran into Tang Yu in the water room, and Wang Hong and He Yiran just went in. How come no one opened the door? Did they all go out?" Another girl passed by in the corridor, stood beside me, and said in confusion.
I raised the corners of my lips slightly and smiled bitterly: "Maybe not!"
I couldn't tell them that I had a conflict with the people in the dormitory and they deliberately didn't open the door for me, right?
"Well, are you going to wait for them to come back, or go to the dormitory supervisor to borrow the key?" The girl who came first asked me with her head tilted.
Before I could think about it, another girl interrupted eagerly, "The dormitory supervisor is not here. I just saw that the light in the duty room is off."
"In that case, you can only wait for someone to come back and open the door. But it's so cold outside, why don't you come to our dormitory and wait?" The girl shivered and suggested kindly.
I shook my head and refused: "No, I'll just wait here!"
"All right!"
The two girls looked at me sympathetically, turned around helplessly and went back to their dormitories.
I stood alone at the door, looking at my hands that were red from knocking, then looked at the still closed dormitory door. The cold wind in the air seemed to blow into my heart, and I felt very cold.
I really can't understand why they have to do things so drastically. We're all going to separate tomorrow, can't we just part ways in peace?
I reached out and knocked on the door a few more times, but still no one opened the door. I stood alone in the cold wind, waiting for them to come out and open the door. As long as they didn't open the door, I would wait outside. Even though my body was frozen stiff, I seemed to want to protect my remaining self-esteem and was unwilling to call their names and beg for their charity.
Inside and outside the door, we were in a stalemate.
Gradually, the entire corridor became quiet. Almost everyone was lying on the bed to rest. The lights in our dormitory were turned off. I was the only one left sitting at the door of the dormitory, hugging my stiff legs, staring with empty eyes at the hot air exhaled from my mouth and nose forming white mist in the air.
Obviously they were willing to get up to turn off the lights, so why didn't they open the door at the same time? The light switch was right next to the door, and if they just stretched their hands a little further, they could let me in, and I wouldn't have to endure the cold anymore.
We have been classmates for half a year and roommates for half a year. How much of a failure am I, Jian Lening? They are not even willing to give me that little bit of distance.
My nose suddenly felt sore and even my eyes became a little moist.
I spread out my hands, which were red and swollen from the cold. The palm of my left hand still had the wound from meeting Anxi and the others, and the back of my right hand still had some red marks from knocking on the door for so long.
I tried hard to suppress the soreness in my nose and hold back the tears that were about to flow. I stubbornly put my hands into my down jacket and pressed them tightly against my swollen and aching chest.
I told myself, Jian Lening, don’t cry, don’t be sad, these are nothing.
Compared to the night when An Xiaoduo had the accident and I was abandoned, compared to the night when I was abandoned again in the hospital, the grievances and pain I suffered tonight are nothing.
Jian Lening, you have endured two miserable nights, so what does tonight matter?
The cell phone in my pocket suddenly rang, bringing my thoughts back to reality. I took out the phone stiffly and looked at the brief words on the screen. The sadness that I had suppressed with great difficulty surged up again.
"Will someone pick you up tomorrow?"
It was Xu Yan, the Xu Yan who had been avoiding me for a long time but still couldn’t let me go.
God knows how excited my heart was when I saw that name at that moment.
It was as if a bonfire had been lit in the cold dark night, warming my limbs. Because of Sun Yu, I recognized my true self and no longer wanted to escape, nor did I have the energy to do so.
At this moment, I long for warmth and an embrace to wrap me up when I am so helpless.
I was like a child who had been lacking love for a long time, or a drug addict. I clutched the cold cell phone tightly, left the dormitory door, and ran towards the stairs with messy steps.
There was only one thought in my mind -
I want to find Xu Yan, the boy who can give me warmth.
Even I couldn't be sure whether he was in the place I thought, but I didn't consider anything else. Relying on my memory, I ran desperately towards the community where Xu Yan rented outside the school.
Before leaving, I did something ridiculous. I used the chalk that I brought from the classroom and placed on the windowsill of the dormitory to write on the dormitory door.
I told Sun Yu that Anxi was looking for trouble with her and asked her to be careful.
Look, how ridiculous I am. I can never be truly cruel.
When I left the message, I was not curious about why Sun Yu hurt Anxi's friend. It was none of my business. After all the cold and pain I had experienced, my feelings for Sun Yu and everyone in this dormitory had disappeared in this lonely and cold night.
I only have one thought now, which is to find Xu Yan.
Some people say that a person needs two impulses in his life, one is to travel recklessly, and the other is to fall in love recklessly.
Since I was a child, I wanted to leave the shantytown and go to a place where there is no ridicule, no contempt, no harm, no abandonment, and no suspicion. If there really is such a place in the world, I will go there regardless of my life. Unfortunately, there is no such place. At least I have never encountered such a place in the past 17 years.
I have never had the opportunity to go on a reckless journey, but I can choose a reckless love.
I know that I am impulsive and unreasonable as I run in the night at this moment.
My relationship with that person had a painful beginning. We were the same kind of people, both children abandoned by God. We should not have been together because we were the unhealable scars on each other.
But so what?
If you were in extreme cold and about to freeze to death, and there was a fire next to you, would you choose to move closer to it and warm yourself?
I think the moths flying into the fire must be very cold, so they are willing to sacrifice their lives in order to get warmth. They know that getting close to the fire means death, but they are still willing to do it.
Because the moth knows that if it doesn't get close, it will die, and the cold is also a tormenting torture.
And I am the moth that flies into the fire, and Xu Yan is the fire. I know that what I am about to plunge into is a destruction, but I also know that it is also the salvation that allows me to be reborn.