Chi Cheng didn't come back that winter, and Tao Xiaodong even made a detour to Beijing on a business trip, but Chi Cheng still didn't go back with him, saying that he had already found a part-time job and made an appointment.
During the Chinese New Year, Chi Cheng transferred the account to Tao Xiaodong, saying it was New Year's money.
Tao Xiaodong also gave him a refund, PS: Brother Tang and I gave it to him, come back quickly next time you are on vacation!
When Chi Cheng left without taking anything, Tao Xiaodong forced a card into his place, which contained a large amount of money. On New Year's Eve, Tao Xiaodong sent a video to Chi Cheng. Tao Huainan was sitting next to him. After the video was broadcast, he stood up silently and went back to his room. He stood in a place where no matter how Tao Xiaodong sat on the sofa and shook his phone, he couldn't get a picture of him.
In the video, Chicheng and Tao Xiaodong said: "Brother, happy new year, give Brother Tang a good time."
"I'm so happy," Tao Xiaodong said to him, "Everyone talks about a reunion on New Year's Eve, but I didn't have a reunion, so how happy I am."
Chi Cheng didn't answer his words, but just smiled.
After the video was hung up, Tao Huainan walked out of the room and went back to sit next to his brother. Tao Xiaodong asked him, "Why don't you talk to my little brother?"
Tao Huainan shook his head and said, "He doesn't want to see me."
"That might be." Tao Xiaodong said.
The brothers didn't know what kind of quarrel they had before Chi Cheng left, Tao Huainan never said anything about it, let alone Chi Cheng. Tao Xiaodong only knew that the two of them must have had a serious fight, but he couldn't imagine how cruel it could be.
Tao Huainan shook his head again, and said softly, "He doesn't even want to come back, he still hates me."
Tao Xiaodong made a special trip to Beijing to pick him up but failed, Chi Cheng was really determined not to come back. Tao Xiaodong said: "There is so much hatred between brothers."
Tao Huainan did not speak, and sat quietly.
Fireworks are not allowed in the city, but there are still people secretly setting them off. Tao Huainan heard the distant bangs outside, and thought of so many real and fake fireworks that Chi Cheng had set off for him.
The speakers for the fireworks on the balcony are still in the cabinet in their room, and they may have broken down.
Every time Tao Xiaodong went to Beijing, he would go to school to see Chi Cheng.
Chi Cheng grew taller and stronger than before. The tall and thin boy with short shaved hair, who likes to wear dark clothes, has completely turned into a handsome guy, the kind of cool boy who is dragging.
Tao Xiaodong teased him: "Isn't it attractive? Have you found someone?"
Chi Cheng was put on his shoulder by his brother, and turned his head: "What are you doing?"
"It's okay, it's too big." Tao Xiaodong patted him and said, "Brother doesn't care about you."
Chi Cheng still didn't turn his head back, because he has a bad temper and doesn't like to talk about this.
At the beginning, the two brothers agreed to chat after the college entrance examination, but due to various reasons, they failed to chat in the end, and there was no need to chat later. Now it is tacit understanding between the two brothers, and they don't mention the things they had to chat about back then.
Tao Xiaodong is a sociable person, and he never makes people feel uncomfortable when socializing outside. He speaks in a moderate manner, and he never says those inappropriate words. But Chi Cheng is not an outsider, and he is a brother after all.
The two young ones had been arguing for so long, and Tao Huainan never let him be mentioned at home, but now that he came out, in front of Chi Cheng, Tao Xiaodong still had to coax him.
This is the first time Tao Xiaodong mentioned Tao Huainan to Chi Cheng.
The tone of the speech was still normal, as if he was just talking about something else, and he mentioned in passing: "I don't know what's wrong with you two, so I won't help to persuade him, sometimes his perspective of thinking is different from ours. If you are angry, you will be angry, and you can’t just go home and not go home.”
Chi Cheng obviously didn't want to talk about this, he stirred the coffee cup, turned his head to look out the window, and didn't say anything.
Tao Xiaodong said: "He's not the only one in the family, isn't there me? What's the matter, you don't even recognize me when you're angry?"
Chi Cheng frowned and said "No".
"If you don't have you, you should go home and go home. We are not every family. What do you always do at school during the holidays?" Tao Xiaodong said again, "If you don't want to talk to him when you go home, we don't talk to him. We have so many houses in our house, and you two live in one. .”
Chi Cheng took a sip of the coffee that he had messed up, without any expression on his face, he just said: "You will always be my brother."
Even though Tao Xiaodong didn't know what happened between the two of them with Chi Cheng's temper, he also knew that Chi Cheng was not easy to coax.
It's true that he didn't coax well, and Chi Cheng still didn't come back during the winter and summer vacations of the second year. Every time Tao Xiaodong goes to Beijing, Chicheng will come out to meet him immediately, and if he knows the time in advance, he will wait for him at the airport or the high-speed rail station.
Brother still recognizes it, but he won't return home.
Towards the end of the second winter, Tao Huainan fell into his old habit again.
He stopped talking again, not for a long time, and tossed a few times.
Tao Huainan actively went to find a doctor and went by himself. Dr. Qi has always been in touch with him. Since he was in college, Tao Huainan would often go to his hospital if he had no classes. Dr. Qi asked him to do so. Not as a patient, but just let him go and have a look, and do whatever he can do. It was only later that Tao Huainan found out that there were several blind consultants in his hospital.
Blind consultants are very busy, and their time is full every time Tao Huainan goes. Many patients who come for consultation will appoint blind consultants, perhaps because they can't see, which can make people more relaxed psychologically.
When he came this time, he said hello first: "Happy Chinese New Year, Dr. Qi."
"Okay, did your brother give you a red envelope?" Dr. Qi was typing on the keyboard at that time, and there were several doctors in the office.
Tao Huainan said, "Here it is", and sat beside him feeling it.
Doctor Qi glanced at him after a while, and asked, "You came here by yourself?"
Tao Huainan nodded, and said distressedly: "It seems that there is trouble again."
Doctor Qi was still very calm, as if it was nothing serious: "Understood, I'll talk about it later."
Fortunately, it wasn't too much trouble this time. Occasionally a few small twists and turns, it will get better soon.
In his sophomore year, Tao Huainan received a scholarship. The department took good care of him, and every time he went to the school for the blind, he specially gave him a set of test papers, and then asked the teachers of the school for the blind to help him correct.
The exam questions were all the same, and Tao Huainan won a first-rank scholarship in the department based on his grades, 8,000 yuan, and gave it all to his brother when he went home.
This year he also took part in a marathon jogging organized by the Association of the Blind, 42 kilometers. Tao Huainan worked hard to persist, but in the end he only finished half of the run.
Volunteers gave him a bottle of water. Tao Huainan was sweating profusely, and his throat was so thirsty that it was about to smoke.
This year, he was still in the small piano shop in front of the school, learning the guitar from the couple who opened the shop. A clean boy, wearing a plaid shirt, sits by the glass and plays the guitar quietly, and occasionally smiles embarrassedly when he plays the wrong note.
Other people passing by the store looked at him through the glass for a while, and then picked up their mobile phones to take a photo of the boy with a healing smile.
This year, Tao Huainan also unexpectedly received a confession from a girl.
After class, Tao Huainan had just packed his things, with his schoolbag on his back, and was fumbling for his blind stick by the table. With a faint fragrance on her body, the girl handed the cane to him.
Tao Huainan said "thank you".
Girls are from different majors in the same college, and you can always meet them in public classes in the college. The girl walked towards the school gate with him, bravely saying that she liked him.
Tao Huainan was very surprised. After a pause, he smiled and said thank you, and then said, "I'm sorry, can't you tell? I like boys."
The girl was more surprised than him, her eyes were rounded, and she couldn't make a sound for a long time. After a while, she asked in a low voice: "Is it true? You didn't want to reject me, did you?"
"Really," Tao Huainan replied calmly, "I heard that boys who like the same sex are easy to recognize, and I thought girls were very accurate in seeing this."
"No way!" Although the girl was rejected, she didn't feel frustrated. After all, she didn't have anything to be frustrated about if she didn't have the same sexual orientation. "Are you sure? Do you already have a boyfriend?"
Tao Huainan thought for a while and said, "I don't have a boyfriend, but I really only like boys, that's for sure."
Girls are amazing and cute. One second she was still a nervous little girl, and the next she became an older sister, and she even praised: "You are so brave, you speak so frankly."
Walking from the classroom to the school gate, the two mentality changes were completed in a short journey. When Tao Huainan said goodbye to her, the young lady cheered him on, saying that she would not speak out and would help him keep the secret.
"It's okay to say it," Tao Huainan smiled gently, "Everyone is very tolerant now."
The house they lived in was far away from Tang Ge Hospital and Tao Huainan's current school, and they all moved to Tang Ge's house later. Xiaodong has other houses, but not as close as Tang Ge's house.
It turned out that nothing in the house was moved, only some clothes were taken.
Tao Huainan also brought an extra pillow.
While rummaging through the closet to pack his clothes, Tao Xiaodong pulled out a stack of Tao Huainan's old blankets.
Tao Xiaodong showed it to Brother Tang and said, "When I was young, I couldn't sleep without a blanket next to my body."
Tang Suoyan said: "Many children have a sleeping habit, some touch their ears, some bite things, and some recognize pillows and quilts like Xiaonan."
Tao Huainan hadn't covered the old blanket for a long time, and he always thought it was thrown away, but it was stored in the cabinet in their room.
Tao Huainan stretched out his hand to touch it, and the touch was still very familiar. Touching it brought back many memories from the past.
"Do you wear it? Maybe it will be better if you cover it when you suffer from insomnia?" Tao Xiaodong asked.
Tao Huainan still suffers from frequent insomnia, other things are fine, this has never been better.
"Don't take it, just put it here." Tao Huainan touched it again, the fluff of the blanket was bald, it was really old. He hugged the pillow in his arms, lowered his head and rubbed it with his face.
When Tao Huainan was a child, he recognized blankets when he slept, but now he recognizes pillows.
Sometimes I can't fall asleep, sometimes I sleep very deeply. I sleep on my stomach and press the pillow between my stomach and the bed. I will be woken up in the middle of the night. When I wake up, I turn over and hug the pillow up. Occasionally, I would sleep too wildly, so I would slant my whole body along the direction of the pillow, with my arms and legs crossed, and my head would reach out, sleeping like a sloth hanging from a tree.
Chi Cheng has been away for more than two years. If Tao Huainan had a dream and fell into a drowsy sleep, he would still open his mouth and mutter a name when he woke up.
You have to wake up completely to remember it, and no one can promise it long ago.
Tao Huainan hugged the pillow and sat up, staring blankly with long hair.
After being dazed, he arranged the two pillows, folded the quilt skillfully, got up, dressed and washed. After that, I can finish it alone when I go to and from school, just like every day.
Life seems to be the same as before.
But if you think about it carefully, everything has obviously changed.