The exhaust fan blades hummed on the rooftop, the sound of distant ambulance sirens rising and falling in the air.
Luo Yang twirled the snapped wire between his fingertips twice and didn't respond.
Qiu Shubai glanced at him again.
“You don’t have to take my words so seriously,” she said.
She spoke slowly, as if weighing every word before letting it out.
“My wishes are just my own. I have no reason to demand that others conform to them. If you hate the feeling of being tied down, you can just act like you never heard what I just said.”
“Everyone’s path is their own to walk.”
The wire in Luo Yang’s hand stopped.
“I don’t like the sound of that.”
Qiu Shubai blinked, caught off guard for a second.
He tossed the wire aside, took off his glasses, and began slowly wiping them with the hem of his hospital pajamas.
Someone had already cleaned the glasses; there wasn't actually any dust on them. He just wanted something to do with his hands.
“You’re not the only one who cares about friends,” he said. “In a way, we’re the same kind of person.”
Qiu Shubai watched him without making a sound.
“You know, I have friends too. Really good friends.” Luo Yang put his glasses back on, a hint of insincere amusement in his voice.
“Yu Mingyang and Lin Ze. One is easily satisfied and currently chasing a girl; the other always thinks he can handle everything but doesn't even know how he got knocked out.”
He let out a short laugh, a puff of air escaping his nose.
“Tell me, if those two ever got stuck in some hellhole, would I go or not?”
He picked up the wire again and bent it into a small loop around his finger.
“My answer is yes. Of course I’d go.”
He spoke softly, as if stating that one plus one equals two—his tone flat, without any rise in pitch.
“Whether I go or not and whether I can bring them back alive are two completely different things. To me, the former isn't a question—it's a requirement.”
Qiu Shubai’s fingers stopped at the edge of the guardrail. The concrete beneath her touch had been chilled by the night wind, its rough texture pressing against her skin.
She didn't say anything. She simply withdrew her hand from the rail and rested it on her knee, her hands overlapping.
“I don’t want to spend every day dreaming about the moment I abandoned a friend,” Luo Yang flicked the wire loop away, letting it fall onto the concrete floor of the rooftop. It bounced once, rolled twice, and finally got stuck against the iron grate of the drainage ditch.
“I don’t want to have that kind of dream even once.”
The rooftop remained quiet for a long time. The exhaust fan blades spun dozens of times. The night wind carried a humid heat up from below, along with the warm scent of the asphalt road slowly releasing the heat it had absorbed during the day.
Qiu Shubai spoke, her voice so soft it was almost carried away by the wind.
“Perhaps you’re right.”
Luo Yang turned his head to look at her. The corner of his mouth twitched, and he shifted less than a fist's width closer to her.
The sleeve of his hospital pajamas brushed against hers, the fabric making a faint rustling sound.
“Let me ask you something.” He leaned in a bit closer.
Qiu Shubai turned her head, her grayish-white hair sweeping over her shoulder. Her eyes were devoid of much expression, showing only a hint of alertness.
Every time this guy spoke in that tone, what followed was almost certainly not going to be anything serious.
“Where did your KK avatar come from?”
Qiu Shubai blinked.
She probably hadn't expected him to ask that. Her gaze shifted from his face to the signal light on the roof of the opposite building.
The red light flashed steadily, once every few seconds. When it lit up, it cast a faint red glow onto the rooftop; when it went dark, the building was left as nothing more than a blurry silhouette.
“This?” She reached up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. “I’ve used it for a long time. I’ve almost forgotten where it came from.”
“Well, think about it now.”
Qiu Shubai thought for a while. The roar of the exhaust fan filled the silence, and the wind carried the occasional sound of a car horn from the distance.
She unconsciously tapped her knee with her fingertip in a slow rhythm, stopping every few beats.
“A childhood playmate of mine,” she began. Her tone was slower than usual, like she was flipping through a dusty old photo album and had to blow the dust off the cover to see what was written inside. “Our families were old friends. Once, she introduced me to an artist online and commissioned this piece.”
She paused.
“She paid for it as a birthday gift for me.”
Luo Yang propped his elbows on his knees and rested his chin in his palms, his expression unchanged. The only sounds on the rooftop were the dull thrum of the exhaust fan blades slicing the air and the occasional streak of light from car headlights on the distant viaduct.
“Then... did you ever talk to that artist later?”
Qiu Shubai frowned slightly. It wasn't out of annoyance; she just couldn't understand why he was fixated on this topic.
But she still nodded.
“I did.”
She paused, her finger no longer tapping her knee. Instead, she began unconsciously twisting a loose thread on the leg of her hospital pajamas. Her fingertips rubbed it a few times, twisting it into a small knot.
“And... we talked quite a bit,” she said, her tone carrying a hint of something else—nostalgia, and a distant understanding of the person she had been back then. “At that time, I would just pour out all my grievances to him.”
The corner of her mouth moved slightly. It wasn't quite a smile, but the curve of her lips softened just a fraction.
“Complaining about things at home, about school, about all the annoying things that made me unhappy as a child. Looking back now, my chat logs with him were probably just one-sided venting sessions. I did all the talking from start to finish, and the person on the other end just listened.”
She turned her head, wanting to see how Luo Yang would react to this silly story from her past.
But Luo Yang wasn't looking at her.
He had his head down. He had taken his glasses off and was wiping them with his hem once again.
This time, there really was nothing on the lenses.
Rate on N.U.
