Gu Jianghan and Xiao Mandong walked out of the guesthouse one after the other and got into the car. Gu Jianghan started the engine and glanced at her.
“Where to?”
Xiao Mandong leaned back against her seat and rubbed at her brow, her voice slightly hoarse.
“The entrance of the supply and marketing cooperative. My bicycle is still parked there.”
Without saying anything, Gu Jianghan turned the wheel and guided the car onto the main road. He didn’t know why, but the person beside him felt somehow familiar. Yet he couldn’t recall where they might have met.
Xiao Mandong stared out the window, still trying to remember where she had heard the name Cui Lijuan before.
After they had driven for a while, Gu Jianghan suddenly spoke.
“Where’s your hometown?”
Xiao Mandong paused and turned to look at him.
Gu Jianghan kept his eyes on the road, his tone casual. “Nothing. Just asking.”
He could feel Xiao Mandong’s gaze on him. His fingers tightened unconsciously around the steering wheel. In truth, he was so nervous his heart was in a flutter. He straightened his back, angling his chin to show off what he considered a rather handsome jawline.
Xiao Mandong didn’t think much of it. “Beijing. What about you?”
Gu Jianghan’s heart gave a sudden leap.
Beijing?
Could it really be such a coincidence? When he was little, he had gone to Beijing with his grandmother and stayed there for a while. He had even met a little girl there. But when it was time to return home, he hadn’t had the chance to say goodbye. More than ten years had passed, and they had never seen each other again.
He instinctively turned his head, wanting to get a clear look at the mole at the corner of her eye, but it was too dark to see anything.
Could it be her? He wanted to ask, but he was afraid of being wrong. If it wasn’t her, how awkward would that be? And if it was… would she still remember him?
“I’m from Haishi,” he said after a pause. “When I was little, I went to Beijing and stayed there for a while.”
Xiao Mandong gave a quiet “Mm” but said nothing else. Still, Brother Jianghan came to mind again. She, too, wanted to know whether they were the same person.
The car soon arrived at the entrance to the supply and marketing cooperative. Gu Jianghan sighed inwardly. He had already driven as slowly as he could—how had they arrived so quickly? But the car was already stopped. He couldn’t exactly say, “Let’s take another lap.”
He turned off the engine and got out after Xiao Mandong.
A lone women’s bicycle stood parked outside the supply and marketing cooperative.
Xiao Mandong took hold of it and looked at Gu Jianghan. “Thank you for today. I’ll be going now.”
With that, she pushed the bicycle and prepared to leave.
Gu Jianghan remained where he was, watching her go. He opened his mouth.
“Wait.”
Xiao Mandong stopped and looked back at him.
He walked over and took the handlebars from her. “It’s so dark… I’ll walk you part of the way.”
Xiao Mandong looked at the pitch-black street and didn’t stand on ceremony. “All right. Thank you.”
Gu Jianghan simply pushed the bicycle forward at an unhurried pace.
Walking behind him, Xiao Mandong began to regret agreeing to let him escort her. At his pace, they wouldn’t make it to her home until midnight.
The two of them walked slowly along. The streetlights stretched their shadows long across the ground, one behind the other, overlapping.
Gu Jianghan pushed the bicycle, its wheels crunching softly over the road.
After they had gone a dozen or so steps, he seemed to recall something and spoke lazily.
“When I was little, my grandmother and I stayed for quite a long time at an elderly Chinese doctor’s home in Beijing. He had a little granddaughter, and we played together every day.”
Gu Jianghan pushed the cart, looking straight ahead. His voice carried a hint of nostalgia, as though he were telling Xiao Mandong a story, though a smile lingered at the corners of his lips.
“Whenever we played games, she always insisted on being my bride…”
Xiao Mandong’s heart was pounding wildly.
Gu Jianghan looked at her and continued, “Once, when we were playing on a sled, she fell into an old grave pit and cried her eyes out. I carried her out on my back.”
Xiao Mandong suddenly lifted her head. Beneath the dim yellow streetlamp, their eyes met, disbelief filling hers.
“Y-you really are Brother Jianghan?”
Gu Jianghan looked at her for a long moment, the corners of his mouth curving slightly. “So you really are that Little Princess.”
Xiao Mandong’s face instantly flushed scarlet.
When she was little, she had been far too mischievous. Her grandmother called her Little Monkey every day, and she had forced everyone to call her Little Princess instead…
Hearing that nickname now was honestly a little embarrassing.
She lowered her head, not daring to look at him again.
They walked a few more steps before Gu Jianghan suddenly asked, “How is Grandpa Xiao?”
Xiao Mandong came to an abrupt stop. Her eyes immediately reddened. It was as if she had run into family at last and wanted to pour out all her grievances. Her voice caught in her throat.
“The Xiao family… was sent down to the countryside…”
“What? How is that possible?” Gu Jianghan could scarcely believe his ears. He remembered his grandfather saying that the Xiao family had been patriotic capitalists. During those difficult years, they had donated no small amount of medicine. How could a family like theirs have been sent down?
Xiao Mandong took a deep breath and forced back her tears.
The air fell silent. Neither of them spoke. Before long, they reached the entrance to the residential compound. Xiao Mandong stopped, took hold of the cart handle, and said, “I’m home. Thank you. I’ll treat you to dinner another day—to repay you for saving my life back then.”
Gu Jianghan smiled, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “All right, Little Princess.”
Xiao Mandong blushed. Just as she was about to say something, Gu Jianghan took a fountain pen from his pocket and grabbed her hand.
His palm was a little sweaty. Why had he impulsively taken a girl’s hand like that?
He forced himself to continue. Not daring to look at her, he quickly wrote down a string of numbers, then let go, his heart hammering in his chest.
When he had finished, he even blew lightly on her palm to dry the ink. Then he put away his pen, turned, and walked off. Without looking back, he raised a hand in farewell.
“My phone number. Call me if you need anything.”
He did not dare turn around. His heart felt as though it were about to leap out of his throat. He could tell that his face must be as red as a monkey’s backside.
After striding more than ten meters away in one breath, Gu Jianghan finally dared to exhale. He glanced back. She had already gone. He clenched his fist, her warmth still lingering in his palm.
Damn it. What a loser.
Xiao Mandong stood at the entrance to the residential compound for a long while before coming back to herself. She looked at the string of numbers on her hand, a faint smile touching her lips. Supporting the cart, she turned and walked into the compound.
That night, she tossed and turned, unable to sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, all she could see were scenes from their childhood.
They used to run around the courtyard together. He would pretend to be the groom, while she insisted on being the bride. And there was his younger brother, cast as the villain—he had tied him up, then gone off with her to eat roasted sweet potatoes, completely forgetting about him. In the end, his brother had pooped his pants. Thinking of it, Xiao Mandong couldn’t help but laugh out loud.
Diandian shot Xiao Mandong a sidelong look. Meeting Diandian’s expression—the way it looked at her as if she were an idiot—Xiao Mandong’s instincts told her that she couldn’t keep putting Diandian in her pocket dimension anymore. She had a feeling Diandian had secretly drunk the spiritual spring water and was getting smarter and smarter.
The next day, Xiao Mandong arrived at the hospital with dark circles under both eyes. From a distance, she saw a line of people outside Director Qi’s consultation room. Sister Li, the nurse, leaned over and lowered her voice.
“There are too many patients looking for Director Qi. Director Qi personally prescribes and dispenses their medicine, and the patients don’t trust anyone else to do it. In the end, the hospital director had to beg him to come back. The injury on Director Qi’s face still hasn’t healed, and he only sees patients for one morning a day…”
Xiao Mandong nodded in understanding. Just then, a familiar voice sounded behind her.
When she turned around, she saw the Red Flag Brigade captain walking toward her, Huzi—Zhao Tiezhu’s son—in tow.
Xiao Mandong hurried forward. “Captain Uncle, what brings you here?”
The captain let out a long sigh.
“Your aunt by marriage—that Li Fengmei—was beaten up by Tiezhu’s wife and her family. She’s badly hurt and is in surgery now. She got sixteen stitches in her head.”
