There is a towering ginkgo at the entrance of the identification center, with a luxuriant canopy. When it is unfolded, it looks like an umbrella. It is said to be more than 500 years old.
When walking down the stairs, Lin Zhaoxi kept looking at the ginkgo. In Strawberry World, Lao Lin liked to bring her to Anning University when she was a child.
In spring, they will fly kites on the large grassland beside the ginkgo trees, and in autumn, they will spend the whole day watching the gardeners of Anning University harvest ginkgo fruit. Probably because their father and daughter have been looking at it from morning to night, and the gardener will always give them a big bag of ginkgo nuts at the end.
Put the ginkgo nuts in an iron pan and fry them for a while. When they are peeled off, they still smell a little bit, but they are completely sweet in the mouth. Lao Lin would fry a few for her every day as a snack on the way to school.
At that time, she really felt that it was a very normal life, but looking at it now, it is a day that she yearns for.
Lin Zhaoxi pressed the cotton to stop the bleeding, but Lao Lin had already thrown away the cotton.
The head of the party walked ahead with a satchel in his hand, stepped down the last step, and looked back at them deeply. Just before she was about to speak, Lao Lin interrupted her.
"Give me a few minutes, I want to make a call." Lao Lin said.
This was the first thing he said after he came out of the oasis base.
Lin Zhaoxi was still standing beside her, subconsciously withdrawing her hands to avoid, but Lao Lin held her tightly.
He pulled her out of the identification center, crossed the path, walked a few steps quickly, and stood still under the camphor tree. The shade of the tree covered a shadow, and there were small spots of light dotted in it.
Lao Lin took out his mobile phone and lit up the screen of the old Nokia.
I don't know if it's the shade of the tree or some other reason, although he still maintains a kind of indifference and restraint, the veined back of his hand still betrays him.
Lin Zhaoxi thought for a while and asked, "Do you want to smoke a cigarette?"
This was the first sentence she said to Lao Lin after they left the base.
Lao Lin looked down at her, smiled self-deprecatingly, and then quickly pressed a series of numbers without avoiding her. Lin Zhaoxi easily saw the numbers on the display.
At the beginning of 021, this is a long-distance call, but when she wanted to see the full number, the last two digits could not be seen clearly because of the reflection.
Lao Lin held up the phone and waited. Lin Zhaoxi couldn't hear the voice on the phone, but she could clearly perceive the moment the phone was connected. She knew that someone on the other end said "Hello", but Lao Lin remained silent.
After a while, before the other party was about to hang up, he said two words: "It's me."
The wind blows the ginkgo leaves, and thousands of them are fanned together.
Lao Lin said in a very straightforward tone: "Now, there is a girl holding my hand and saying that she is my daughter. We just came out of the laboratory. I would like to ask you, what is the probability of a relationship between us?" ?”
The person on the other end of the phone didn't know what to say, but it was possible to hang up the phone directly. After a few seconds, Lao Lin sneered and put away the phone.
It didn't even take a few minutes, and the whole call and waiting time was only 30 seconds.
Lao Lin threw the phone back into his pocket. Although he sneered, a normal human emotional reaction finally appeared on his face. A few missing light spots fell on the corners of his mouth and between his eyebrows. They were very bright, so other parts appeared darker.
He blew the wind alone for a while before looking down at her.
"What's the probability?" Lin Zhaoxi raised her head and asked.
Subconsciously, Lao Lin wanted to touch his pocket for a cigarette, but he held back in the end. He squatted down and looked at her in a different position.
Lin Zhaoxi looked at her father who was shorter than herself, and lowered her head and asked, "Who is it? Why did you throw me into the orphanage back then?"
This question was like a spell to break the seal. Lao Lin smiled slowly and said, "You know more than me, why do you still ask me?"
Lin Zhaoxi was speechless for a moment. She cleared her throat, and her explanation could finally come in handy.
"Let me tell you, things..."
Before he finished uttering the last sound of the word "love", Lao Lin stretched out his arms, pressed the back of her head with his wide palm, and pressed her tightly on his shoulders.
Lao Lin was still standing while squatting, and she was still standing.
The bright green color of ginkgo covered her retina, and it seemed to turn into a soft summer wind in an instant. It was supported by dense blood vessels and had a very strong skeleton.
Lin Zhaoxi's hand rested lightly on Lao Lin's back. She could feel the great strength contained in Lao Lin's arm that restrained her body, but Lao Lin seemed to have lifted all the burdens that had always been on her. She could feel it, but she couldn't say anything. .
Dang Aiping stood on the steps, watching them all the time.
She saw the curious and probing eyes of the little girl, saw their brief conversation, and witnessed the movement of the man slowly embracing the child after he hung up the phone.
She finally let out a long sigh. She kept thinking why people always have to give their children a home. In fact, not only children, adults also need it.
So lonely.
—
On the way back, Dang Aiping refused to go back to the oasis base, and she asked the head of the summer camp to drive the car to the entrance of the Red Star Welfare Institute.
There was a familiar and cramped alley in front of her. She opened the car door, and the man who had been sitting silently in the back seat also opened the door at the same time.
Lin Zhaoxi wanted to follow, but was blocked by the car door closed by the man behind his back. The car door was locked with a click. The little girl grabbed the window, pointed at the driver in the cab, and knocked on the window with a terrified expression.
Looking at the little girl's wonderful and rich expressions through the car window, Dang Aiping felt both warm and sour. The child she raised might really be leaving. The hug under the ginkgo tree made her feel very clear.
She shifted her gaze to the man beside her, and she nicknamed the young man Lin Chaoxifei pestered to call her father "Provisional Father Lin".
She asked "what's going on", tentatively Father Lin took her a few steps to a secluded corner. In all these years of working in the orphanage, she has seen too many people's feelings and helplessness, but Lin's father's answer is still an excuse she has never heard before.
"I don't know." The man said, holding a cigarette between his fingertips and lighting it by the trash can.
"What do you mean you don't know?" Dang Aiping frowned, and used experience to complete the story, "You don't know her existence, so the child was abandoned by her mother after she was pregnant before marriage?"
The man lowered his eyebrows, took a breath of his cigarette, and shook his head.
"What do you mean by shaking your head? It means that you have no children, and everything is delusional? But if you have no children, why do you go to the orphanage to look at her files?" Dang Aiping became angry again.
"I went to the orphanage purely because I didn't know where this girl came from. She pestered me all day, so I went to investigate to see where she came from."
"What was the motivation behind the investigation."
"Not at that time, maybe it was too busy."
"You didn't answer directly." Dang Aiping said sharply, "Have you ever had a child, and then lost the child? If a man has never had sex, he will never investigate the children in the orphanage."
"I had a child, but I thought the child was dead, so there is no abandonment or investigation." Tentative father Lin finished calmly, and added, "You are very sharp."
"I've seen a lot."
"Yes, I understand."
Dang Aiping looked at this man and knew he was telling the truth.
She has to receive some parents every month, many of them have traveled thousands of miles, hoping to come to the orphanage to find their lost children.
She didn't know what kind of mood this "provisional Lin father" had when looking at Lin Zhaoxi's file, perhaps it was more difficult than those people.
"Why are you so stupid?" Dang Aiping turned her head to look at the car, while Lin Zhaoxi and Zhang Shuping maintained a stiff posture, "It's not as good as Lin Zhaoxi."
Tentatively, Lin's father also took a look at that, and he shook the cigarette again, revealing the blood-drawing needle in his hand: "I'm not as good as her."
Dang Aiping said, "But have you ever thought about what you're going to do if your DNA doesn't match?"
"You ask this, do you want me to say that I'm still willing to adopt her?" Tentative father Lin put out his cigarette butt and asked.
"It's her who is determined to go with you. She told me to bet on the Jin Cup champion. If she wins the first place, she wants the right to choose her family freely. It's because of you, right?" Dang Aiping said, " I don't know what's going on in her mind all day, how can I know these things that you don't know."
"Children have secrets." Lao Lin said, "Adults are not much better."
He put out the cigarette butt, walked to the parking lot, and said, "Wait for five days, don't ask her, I'll just ask."
—
The conversation between Lao Lin and the head of the party was very short, and Lin Zhaoxi kept looking around.
Dean Dang will definitely ask Lao Lin how he lost her. This is a past event she really wants to know. what.
And in the end, the dean's mother will definitely target her again. She loves to hide things, is weird, and doesn't know what is going on in her mind...
But in fact, this is what Lin Zhaoxi is most afraid of. She is afraid of being forced to question her.
However, the situation of the three joint trials she imagined did not happen, and on the way back, Lao Lin didn't mention it.
Zhang Shuping put them down in front of the teaching building.
When parking the car, Vice President Zhang, who didn't say a word from the beginning to the end, put on the handbrake, and finally said: "According to the regulations, this is a closed summer camp, and parents cannot stay with their children."
After watching a scene where father and daughter recognize relatives from beginning to end, what Zhang Shuping cares about is the summer camp rules
Even Lao Lin was taken aback, let alone Lin Zhaoxi.
Vice-principal Zhang glanced at the rearview mirror: "Otherwise, I asked if you are the biological father and daughter, and asked each of you to tell me about your mental journey for an hour. What does this have to do with me?"
"It took five days for the DNA test results to come out." Lao Lin said.
Lin Zhaoxi: "So we are not father and daughter in these five days."
Zhang Shuping gave a disdainful "heh" and told them to get out of the car without saying anything, and drove away by himself.
It's been less than four hours since I left, and the oasis base hasn't changed much.
The sound of Xie Ran's lecture came from the 7th floor. Lin Zhaoxi looked around, but couldn't find an interjection, so he could only look up at Lao Lin, hesitant to speak.
This was the first time they had alone time after they met their relatives. Lao Lin must have a lot to say to her. Lin Zhaoxi looked up at Lao Lin, ready to have a long talk with his father.
Lao Lin touched her head and said four words: "Go to class."
After he finished speaking, he turned around and left without dragging his feet.
"Dad, what are you going to do?" Lin Zhaoxi was anxious.
"Go to work." Lao Lin took out his mobile phone to check the time, "It's time for dinner soon, the cafeteria is busy."
Lin Zhaoxi:? ?