After the firecrackers went off outside the window, the room seemed unusually quiet. The two people's rising and falling breathing was still entangled with the excitement that had not completely subsided.
An He closed his eyes. Now, both physically and mentally, he had an indescribable feeling. The comfortable tiredness after letting out all the excitement made his whole body go limp.
It was not until Na Chen lifted himself up from his body that he opened his eyes and looked at the collar around Na Chen's neck. The leash was still in his hand. He pulled the leash and said, "Little Leopard, are you still obedient now?"
Na Chen propped himself up on the bed and looked at him: "I'll listen."
"Pour me a glass of water." Angela pulled the belt.
"Well, how about fruit tea?" Na Chen got off the bed and walked to the small table.
"Okay," An He sat up, looked down at his body, and found many small red spots on his skin, "You bit me?"
"I don't know." Na Chen smiled, handed him the cup, and leaned close to his ear, "Your humming sounds really nice. Every time I hear it, I want to bite you."
An He also smiled, with no expression on his face, but the feeling of embarrassment that he couldn't suppress in his heart almost burst out of his ears.
"Take it off." He flicked the collar on Nachen's neck with his fingers.
When An He walked into the bathroom with Na Chen's pajamas, he saw the blush on his face in the mirror that had not completely disappeared. He stared at it for a while, turned on the shower, and whispered, "Are you feeling good? You're so excited."
The warm water flowed over An He from head to toe. He lowered his head and closed his eyes, supporting himself with his arms against the wall and not wanting to move. He couldn't even muster the energy to spin around and just wanted to lie down.
He didn't know how long he had been rushing like this, but he heard the sound of a guitar coming from the bedroom. After listening for a while, he recognized it was the sound of Castle in the Sky.
An He liked it very much and played it on repeat in his house for a while.
He closed his eyes and listened for a while, then turned around, leaned against the wall and began to whistle along.
The sound of guitar outside the door paused for a moment, then quickly resumed and became the accompaniment.
An He was originally planning to stop after playing twice, but when he heard Na Chen being so supportive, he had no choice but to finish the entire section before stopping.
Na Chen's guitar didn't stop playing, it kept looping the interlude, as if waiting for him to continue the next part. He listened for a long time, then went over and knocked on the bathroom door: "It's dead."
Na Chen didn't say anything, and the guitar returned to its previous melody.
It was almost four o'clock when both of them finished their shower and lay down on the bed. An He faced the wall, but he was no longer sleepy.
Na Chen came over from behind and put his arm around him: "Are you sleepy?"
"Do you want to chat?" An He remembered the day when Na Chen asked him to chat with him at the gate of the community.
"Go to sleep if you're tired," Na Chen buried his face in his back, his voice a little muffled, "Are you going home to kowtow to your parents tomorrow? I'll wake you up."
"No need." An He closed his eyes.
"I don't need it either." Na Chen said in a low voice.
"Aren't you going to visit your mother during the New Year?" An He turned over and looked at him sideways.
"I went to see it today," Na Chen smiled with the corners of his mouth curled, "but I got kicked and rushed back."
Na Chen said it easily, but An He felt uncomfortable listening to it: "Where did you kick?"
"Neck," Na Chen touched the side of his neck, "My mother must have been practicing lower body kung fu in the hospital these years..."
An He propped up his arms and looked at Na Chen's neck in the light of the night light. There was a dark red scratch on his neck. He had seen it before and thought it was caused by the collar. He also recalled how much force he used when he pulled the belt.
"That was a pretty hard kick." An He lay back on the pillow, feeling a little emotional.
From childhood to adulthood, he has been beaten many times. His father only sees him a few times a year, but it is common for him to take his anger out on him and beat him up when he comes home. His mother beats him at irregular intervals, mainly depending on his luck at the card table.
"Maybe she thought I poisoned her and wanted to kill her," Na Chen said with a smile, his tone very calm, "so she took the initiative, but it's not always like this."
Unlike when he mentioned his father, Na Chen was always calm when he mentioned his mother. An He could even hear the tolerance and attachment in his voice.
An He was silent for a while. Na Chen's words of striking first reminded him of what Na Chen said when they went to the used car lot. After holding it in for a long time, he couldn't help but ask, "The wound on your waist is..."
"Yes, my mother stabbed me." Na Chen said softly, tightening his arms around An He.
An He felt a tightness in his chest and couldn't speak for a long time.
"Just keep running forward, keep running forward, and when you look up you'll see the stars," Na Chen said in his ear, his voice sounding a little ethereal, "Go to sleep, good night."
"Good night."
Probably because he played with his pet, An He fell asleep in a few minutes. However, he was a little picky about sleep, so he didn't sleep well and had many dreams.
His father, whom he hadn't seen for a long time, appeared in his dream. He still looked the same as when he was in school, and was arguing with his mother about the same fights he had heard when he was in school. However, he couldn't hear what was being said. He just sat alone on a small stool by the door waiting for them to end the fight.
The battle level was rising, and he retreated to the corner in fear, fearing that the two of them would see him and throw a stool at him.
But his mother still rushed over, and he suddenly felt his whole body stiff, as if wrapped by something hard. He couldn't breathe, and his heart was full of panic.
He wanted to struggle, but he couldn't move.
He opened his mouth and wanted to call out "Mom", but no sound came out.
"Mom..." He heard someone calling his mother, but it was not his voice.
This frightened him and he struggled hard.
"Mom, I was wrong... I was wrong..."
The voice in his ears became clearer and clearer, but except for the three words "I was wrong", everything else was very vague and he couldn't understand the content. When An He suddenly opened his eyes, he found that Na Chen's arm was pressed on his chest, and he could hear him mumbling indistinctly: "I was wrong..."
"Daqi?" An He took his arm away from him and gently pushed him, "That Chen!"
Na Chen frowned and it was completely unclear what he said. He just hummed softly, and it sounded like he was having a nightmare.
"Hey," An He pushed him again, "Are you dreaming?"
Na Chen frowned, turned over, slowly opened his eyes, and looked at him in confusion.
It was getting a little bright outside the window, and An He saw through the light that Na Chen's forehead was covered with tiny beads of sweat.
"Did you have a nightmare?" he asked.
"What's wrong?" Na Chen touched his face.
"I heard you talking in your sleep."
Na Chen paused, his voice a little heavy: "What did you say?"
An He thought for a moment and said, "I didn't hear it clearly. Maybe it's my fault..."
Before he could finish his words, Na Chen suddenly sat up.
An He was startled. Before he could figure out what was going on, Na Chen suddenly threw back the quilt and jumped out of bed. His voice became cold: "Go to sleep. I'll wake you up at nine o'clock."
An He didn't say anything. Na Chen turned and walked out of the bedroom and closed the door.
Smoking again
An He sighed and lay back on the pillow, hugging the quilt and turning over to face the wall.
He was very sleepy and in a bad mood. Na Chen's reaction, which was no longer surprising to him, did not affect his sleepiness too much. Not long after he closed his eyes, he fell asleep again.
And he didn't have any more dreams, which made him quite moved in his hazy state.
“My country and I cannot be separated for a moment… Wherever I go, a song of praise flows…”
When the music sounded in An He's ears, he felt like he had just fallen asleep not long ago. The loud and moving female voice made him unable to recover for a long time.
"I sing of every mountain, I sing of every river..."
An He finally understood that it was the phone that Na Chen had thrown on the bedside that was ringing. He sighed, reached out to take the phone and took a look.
Dr. Chen from the Fifth Hospital.
"Nachen!" An He shouted, waking up from his half-asleep state, and ran out of the bedroom with his cell phone.
There was no one in the corridor on the second floor and the doors of several rooms were closed. He shouted again, but there was no response from Na Chen, so he just ran downstairs.
As soon as I went downstairs, I saw Nachen sitting in the middle of the large mahogany sofa in the living room.
"Your phone." An He said.
"My motherland and I are like the sea and a wave..." Na Chen started singing along with the ringing tone of his cell phone, holding a cigarette in his mouth.
"From the Fifth Academy." An He handed the phone to him.
Na Chen looked down and continued to sing: "The waves are the children of the sea, and the sea is the support of the waves..."
An He didn't say anything else. He threw the phone at him, turned and walked towards the stairs. The floor clock in the living room rang, and the clanging sound made people feel blocked in their hearts.
It's half past eight, time to go back.
"Hello, Dr. Chen, Happy New Year." Na Chen answered the phone.
An He stopped and turned to look at him. Na Chen's voice was trembling.
"It's okay. You said... um... what? I see... um, I'll be there right away..." Na Chen had been staring at the floor. After the call ended, he slowly raised his head and looked at An He. "I wanted to make breakfast for you, but I have to go out for a while."
"Going to the hospital?" An He nodded and wanted to go upstairs to change clothes, but when he saw Na Chen's face, he stopped. Na Chen's face was very pale.
"Well, my mother was cutting her wrists for fun this morning." Na Chen's voice sounded relatively calm, but his steps were heavy as he walked up the stairs.
An He was a little surprised. How could a patient get a knife in a mental hospital? But he didn't ask any more questions. He followed Na Chen back to the bedroom. After changing his clothes, Na Chen said, "Go back," and walked out of the bedroom quickly.
"Let me take you there." An He held his coat. He was not a kind-hearted person, but seeing Chen's condition, he couldn't just leave like that.
"No, it's my own business." Na Chen answered straightforwardly.
"I'll take you there." An He said straightforwardly.
Na Chen turned around abruptly and stared at his face: "I said, I'll go by myself."
"Do you think I really want to send you there?" An He frowned and stared at him. "If you go out like this now and hit someone or flip the car over, I'm afraid the police will come to question me!"
The neighborhood is very quiet at this moment. The ground is covered with red firecracker debris and the air is still filled with the lingering smell of gunpowder.
"Every Chinese New Year," Na Chen sat in the passenger seat, leaning back and looking out the window, "I start to feel anxious before the New Year. I don't know why, but I just feel particularly anxious and lost. Have you ever had this feeling before?"
Yes.
An He didn't say anything, his eyes fixed on the red color on the road, what a festive color.
"Everyone is rushing home. It's warm there, and there are delicious foods and people gather together," Na Chen didn't seem to need An He's response. He just kept looking out the window and said, "When I look at these people, I feel that they have all left and gone home. There are fewer and fewer people outside, and no one can even take a look at you..."
An He drove in silence. There were almost no cars on the street today and it was not snowing. He stepped on the accelerator and sped up towards the Fifth Hospital.
Na Chen's voice gradually became lower and disappeared.
But today he talked more than ever before. After being silent for a few minutes, he started talking again.
"I hate answering the phone," he said, glancing at An He, "Nachen, your mom had another attack today, Nachen, your mom smashed the neighbor's car today, Nachen, your mom went crazy, Nachen, your dad had a car accident, Nachen, your dad died..."
"Stop talking." An He took a breath and slowly exhaled.
"Are you annoying?" Na Chen said.
An He didn't say anything, he didn't know what to say.
"My dad said I was annoying. He said, Nachen, everyone hates you."
"Stop talking!" An He honked the horn hard.
Na Chen finally stopped talking, smiled, stretched, and stared at the road ahead.
This state of non-stop talking made An He clearly feel the uneasiness and tension in Na Chen's heart.
"I don't hate you, nor do I find you annoying." An He said after a long time.
"Thanks."
The entrance to the Fifth Hospital was very clean, with no firecracker debris. Only the couplets outside the door indicated that the patients here were also celebrating the New Year.
An He stopped the car and was about to get out when Na Chen pressed him: "Wait for me in the car."
"Huh?" An He was stunned.
"Don't go in, wait for me here." Na Chen looked at him.
"Okay," An He didn't ask any more questions. He knew why. "Call me if you need help."
Na Chen jumped out of the car and ran into the hospital gate.
An He casually put a CD in his pocket and listened to it, staring blankly at the big tree outside the gate of the Fifth Courtyard that had lost all its leaves.
Although he was unwilling, the words that Na Chen had been saying uncontrollably before began to loop in his mind, which made him feel very bad.
He studied psychology in college, but now he is unwilling to analyze anyone's psychology except his students, as he has a lot of bad emotions that he has no place to vent.
He was not someone who was easily influenced, but Na Chen's somewhat dark past still made him feel depressed. On the one hand, he wanted to get rid of this feeling, and on the other hand, he habitually wanted to analyze more.
An He sighed softly, lit a cigarette and stared at the sign of the Fifth Hospital in front of him in a daze.
This period of time has been extraordinary enough, and he never thought that he would be like this one day.
But enough is enough. This kind of madness that can throw everything aside is more disturbing than loneliness.
Or... stay away from this person.