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After discussing the ticket purchase, the two suddenly fell silent on the phone, but neither of them seemed willing to hang up.
After a while, Lin Xi finally asked, "What about Brother Shaojie? Is he coming home with us?"
Last time, Lin Xi knew that An Shaojie didn't want to go home with them, and in the end, she returned home with Simple.
"He..." Qinglan hesitated slightly. "He's not coming home with us; he's going back tomorrow. He has something going on at home."
Lin Xi certainly didn't believe An Shaojie's reason for not returning with them, but she didn't ask further.
In the afternoon, Qinglan and Xu Wen went to the station to buy two train tickets for their return trip the following day.
The next day, in the dormitory, the four girls were there, and Shen Xiaomeng had gone home.
This time, Hu Jiao'er was also going to Zhou Xiaochuan's house.
Hu Jiao'er applied to go to Zhou Xiaochuan's herself because after seeing Shen Xiaomeng visit Hao Chuanze's family and how things turned out, she wanted to meet Zhou Xiaochuan's family as well. She also wanted to see if her relationship with Zhou Xiaochuan could withstand the scrutiny of his family and friends. If it couldn't, it would be better to break up sooner rather than later to avoid prolonged pain.
Jiang Liuying stayed behind to help Mosen move things because their art school was relocating to another campus, and all dormitory moves had to be completed before the holiday.
So that night, only Qinglan was left in the dormitory.
The dormitory felt very empty.
Qinglan dialed An Shaojie's now non-existent phone number over and over again; she knew she would never get through again.
In fact, she rarely dialed those few Arabic numbers before; she disliked dialing them because she feared the cold feeling they brought her. But now, she wasn't afraid anymore. She boldly pressed those numbers repeatedly. On the other end, there were no cold words anymore, just polite, formal, and stiff responses: "Sorry, the number you dialed does not exist." These words made her feel the loneliness and emptiness of this world, just like her current environment. She could hear the noise outside her world while inside it was silent and still.
She was already quite certain that the number she had once memorized by heart was no longer related to her.
She deleted that number.
After a while, she opened her call log, found the number again, and saved it once more.
Then she deleted it again.
Finally, she took out her light blue diary that had accompanied her for many years and wrote the phone number on the front page.
This diary was a gift from Lin Xi. She and An Shaojie each had one.
In middle school, An Shaojie started writing in this diary. But Qinglan couldn't bear to use it and kept it until after her senior year before finally starting to write. She felt that her feelings for An Shaojie at that time were like this diary, sealed away for so long and now should be opened.
Now, this diary was already filled to the brim with Qinglan's thoughts, leaving no space at all, and she sealed it up again.
After writing down the number, Qinglan deleted that expired phone number from her phone once more.
Placing her phone on the desk, Qinglan walked out of the dormitory.
Strolling through the campus, she thought about how over the years she had given up an entire forest for him, yet in the end, she didn't even know where he was now. Qinglan found herself somewhat ridiculous. She had believed that as long as she persisted, there would be results; who knew it would turn out like this? She thought that if she invested genuine feelings, it would touch him, melt him, or warm him up; little did she know he wasn't a block of ice that could melt, not even a piece of steel. He was just a piece of wood; aside from slowly decaying himself or her directly turning him to ashes, there was nothing she could do to him.
Since that's the case, let him decay slowly by himself. From childhood to adulthood, Qinglan had never been able to be cruel to him; she wouldn't turn him to ashes because she'd rather burn herself to ashes instead.
Unknowingly, she found herself on that patch of grass, imagining that someone might appear in the darkness like last time.
There was no one.
Until she reached the center of the lawn, she did not see a single person. The empty lawn was only filled with the cold wind and her presence.
She sat down and lingered for a while on the cold grass.
Suddenly, she thought about whether he would go to the rental place on the last night of this semester.
Qinglan abruptly woke up, jumping up from the lawn and sprinting towards the outside of the school at nearly full speed.
In the shortest time, she stood in front of the rental houses, panting heavily. She patted her chest to calm herself down first.
Then she took out her keys from her pocket, but due to her panic, her hands were shaking so much that she missed the keyhole several times.
The door opened, and inside was complete darkness. Qinglan cautiously stepped inside.
As she entered the room, everything looked just as it had before; it seemed nothing had changed or moved at all.
It appeared he had not come.
Qinglan stepped out of the room and surveyed the living room. There had never been much furniture in the living room—just a somewhat worn sofa and a TV cabinet—so there was hardly anything to indicate any changes.
She initially planned to turn around and leave, but just as she was about to do so, she noticed a cup on the dining table, along with an electric kettle for boiling water.
At a glance, Qinglan recognized that cup as An Shaoping's usual drinking cup; he typically kept it on the dining table as well, showing no significant changes.
But the electric kettle is usually kept in the kitchen, so it couldn't possibly be on the dining table.
After just a few seconds of thought, Qinglan rushed forward.
She first picked up a cup that had a little water in it, and the walls of the cup were still damp, indicating that someone had used it to drink water not long ago. She then touched the electric kettle, which was surprisingly warm, and there was a large pot of water inside.
He has been here!
And definitely not more than an hour ago!
If he had sat here for a while, he must have just left.
Thinking of this, Qinglan ran back to the room and checked the bedside table and wardrobe, as well as rummaging through the drawers of their usual study desk.
Everything he left here was still there.
Qinglan finally breathed a sigh of relief.
This proves that he will come back here.
Also, her meal card is still with him!
After locking the door, Qinglan went downstairs and happened to run into a girl from the neighborhood. In the hallway, she grabbed Qinglan and asked in surprise, "Why haven't you all been around for a long time? It feels very empty without you." Qinglan smiled and replied, "It's busy with exam reviews at the end of the semester. Plus, it's cold now; running around is quite troublesome."
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