It was after two o'clock in the afternoon when Yang Zhao received the call from Chen Mingsheng.
She was working then.
When she saw the caller ID on her mobile phone, she felt a little strange. Chen Mingsheng knew that she was working from one to six. According to his habits, he probably wouldn't call at this time.
She answered the phone and asked, "Chen Mingsheng, what's the matter?"
Chen Mingsheng said: "I'm downstairs at your house, I want to see you."
Yang Zhao was startled, "Downstairs?" She came to the window with her mobile phone, and sure enough, she saw Chen Mingsheng standing on the roadside downstairs. Yang Zhao said, "Why are you here?"
She heard Chen Mingsheng's voice hoarse, and he said, "I want to see you."
It's rare for Yang Zhao to take a break during working hours. She put aside the matter at hand and said, "Wait for me, I'll go down right away."
Yang Zhao went downstairs and came to Chen Mingsheng. Chen Mingsheng looked a little tired.
"Why are you here at this time, are you off work?"
Chen Mingsheng said, "I didn't go to work today."
Yang Zhao nodded and said, "It's good to take a day off."
Chen Mingsheng didn't speak.
Yang Zhao smiled and said, "You came to look for me, did you miss me?"
Chen Mingsheng looked at her face, smiled lightly and said, "En."
Yang Zhao said, "Come up and sit down."
Chen Mingsheng said, "No, I'll leave later."
Yang Zhao said, "Alright, then I'll—"
"Yang Zhao."
When Chen Mingsheng interrupted her, Yang Zhao raised his eyebrows and looked at him, and said, "Huh?"
Chen Mingsheng paused for a while and said, "I have something I want to tell you."
Yang Zhao said, "What is it?"
Chen Mingsheng lowered his head slightly, and said in a low voice, "I... I may have to leave for a while."
Yang Zhao was stunned.
"What?"
Chen Mingsheng said: "I may have to leave for a while."
Yang Zhao said, "Where are you going?"
Chen Mingsheng said, "Go back to my hometown."
Yang Zhao said, "Oh, by the way, I haven't asked you yet. Your accent doesn't sound like a local one. Where is your home?"
Chen Mingsheng said, "Qinghai."
"Qinghai." Yang Zhao smiled and said, "It's really far away."
She folded her arms and exhaled softly in the cold wind.
"Are you going home to visit your relatives?"
Chen Mingsheng nodded, "En."
Yang Zhao said, "How long."
Chen Mingsheng paused and said, "... I don't know."
Yang Zhao chuckled, "I don't know?"
Chen Mingsheng pursed his lips and hummed softly.
Yang Zhao looked at Chen Mingsheng and said slowly, "Chen Mingsheng, I don't quite understand."
Chen Mingsheng said: "I will do it as soon as possible, don't worry, okay."
Yang Zhao looked at the tree beside him, the leaves had withered, and only a few yellowed dead leaves were left, spinning on the branches.
After a while of silence, Yang Zhao said flatly, "Chen Mingsheng, you can't be like this forever."
The wind blows, rolling up the dust on the ground, grains and grains.
Yang Zhao looked at Chen Mingsheng and said, "Tell me, what are you going to do."
Chen Mingsheng lowered his head, tightly clutching his crutches.
Yang Zhao said, "Chen Mingsheng, I'm not as fragile as you think."
Chen Mingsheng raised his head, and Yang Zhao's expression completely appeared in front of his eyes. She was so calm, so calm that she was almost indifferent.
Indeed, she is not vulnerable.
Suddenly, Chen Mingsheng recalled many episodes from the past. It seems that Yang Zhao can never be associated with fragility. From the first day he knew her, this woman has been going forward bravely.
Her courage is not easy to see from the outside, but deep in the bone marrow, assimilated with the soul. Her courage comes from self-confidence, from a complete understanding of herself.
In fact, she is not so much courageous as she is determined—firm and unconfused.
Chen Mingsheng suddenly had an urge to tell everything, not for her, but for himself. He felt that Yang Zhao would be a kind of support, a kind of support in his spiritual world.
With her around, he has nothing to fear.
And he actually said it.
"I'm going to do what I used to do."
Yang Zhao said, "What is it?"
Chen Mingsheng opened his mouth, and he suddenly realized that perhaps it was the long silence that caused him to not know where to start when he really wanted to say something.
Yang Zhao said, "Things like on the train?"
Chen Mingsheng nodded.
Yang Zhao said, "Is there any danger?"
Before Chen Mingsheng could answer, Yang Zhao had already continued. "It's dangerous, isn't it?"
Chen Mingsheng thought for a while, then nodded again.
Yang Zhao turned around and walked into the building, saying, "Come up."
"Yang Zhao, I—"
"I'll tell you." Yang Zhao paused every word.
She turned her head and looked into Chen Mingsheng's eyes. Chen Mingsheng felt that her eyes now were very similar to the way she looked at her brother at the police station when they first met.
Solemn and severe.
Yang Zhao glanced at him indifferently, then turned and walked upstairs. Chen Mingsheng didn't dare to say a word, and followed her silently.
Yang Zhao led him all the way into the house and came to the sofa. They sat one on the left and one on the right, looking at each other face to face.
Chen Mingsheng felt that this scene was a bit like an interrogation.
Yang Zhao said, "How long."
Chen Mingsheng said, "I don't know either."
Yang Zhao said, "Chen Mingsheng."
Chen Mingsheng: "Um... half a year?"
Yang Zhao looked at him without squinting. Chen Mingsheng said: "...one year?"
Yang Zhao frowned imperceptibly.
Chen Mingsheng felt his palms sweat a little, which made him more nervous than all the conversations he had experienced before.
"Yang Zhao, I... I really don't know how long it will take. If it goes well, it may be over in a few months."
"It's not going well."
Chen Mingsheng clasped his hands together, and Yang Zhao said again, "Forget it, it won't go badly."
Chen Mingsheng looked up at her, and Yang Zhao picked up the water glass on the coffee table and took a sip of water.
That old-fashioned tea mug, Chen Mingsheng saw it now, and felt very kind.
"Leave someday."
Chen Mingsheng said, "Recently."
Holding the tea mug in his hand, Yang Zhao said, "Then follow me to my house later."
Chen Mingsheng didn't understand at the beginning, "At home?"
"Um."
It took Chen Mingsheng a while to realize that Yang Zhao wanted to take him to meet her relatives.
"See... meet your parents?"
"Um."
Yang Zhao put down the tea mug, looked at Chen Mingsheng fixedly, and said, "Wait for me to clean it up, we'll leave now."
"Wait...wait." Chen Mingsheng was completely stunned, just like when he came to Yang Zhao with anxiety, but Yang Zhao told him that they were going on a trip.
Yang Zhao didn't listen to him, stood up, and was about to go back to the bedroom to change clothes. Chen Mingsheng was in a hurry, so he stood up straight away, supported the coffee table in front of him with one hand, and leaned over to hold Yang Zhao.
"Yang Zhao—"
Yang Zhao turned his head, "What?"
Chen Mingsheng: "Shall we go now?"
Yang Zhao nodded, "That's right."
"But—" Chen Mingsheng's mind was in a mess, "But I still—"
Yang Zhao saw that Chen Mingsheng was bent over, struggling to support one leg, so he supported his hand to make him stand up straight, and said, "Chen Mingsheng, you promised me."
Chen Mingsheng was silent.
Yang Zhao stood in front of him, slightly raised his head, his eyes were deep.
"Did you forget when you were in Mount Wutai? You proposed to me." She kept looking at Chen Mingsheng, as if she wanted to look into the depths of his soul.
"I promise, Chen Mingsheng." She said, "I promise."
Chen Mingsheng didn't speak, Yang Zhao turned and walked to the bedroom.
Chen Mingsheng lowered his head and stood behind Yang Zhao. When Yang Zhao was about to enter the room, he called her name in a low voice.
"Yang Zhao."
That shallow whisper made it difficult for Yang Zhao to move forward.
"I still won't go." Chen Mingsheng didn't look at Yang Zhao's back, his eyes stayed on the old tea mug on the coffee table. "Yang Zhao, if there is a chance in the future, I will visit your parents again."
Yang Zhao's hand rested on the doorknob, the handle glowed with light gold, and it was cold to hold.
Chen Mingsheng raised his head and saw Yang Zhao's back. She didn't look back, and she didn't speak.
Chen Mingsheng felt as if a boulder was being pressed against his chest, and every time he opened his mouth, the stone became heavier and heavier.
Slowly, Yang Zhao turned around. She looked at Chen Mingsheng from afar and said, "Do you have to go?"
Chen Mingsheng paused, but did not answer.
Yang Zhao came over and said, "Is there no other solution, Chen Mingsheng, if you need money, you—"
"No need." Chen Mingsheng quickly said to her, "No need to spend money."
Yang Zhao looked at the tall man in front of her, and she felt a deep sense of powerlessness.
It is a kind of irreversible, realistic weakness that comes from many aspects. That was his own choice. Yang Zhao knew that the choice he made must have been carefully considered.
Yang Zhao picked up the cigarette case from the tea table, took out a cigarette from it, and lit it.
"Chen Mingsheng, this is your decision, I can't interfere with anything." She took a puff of cigarette, and then clasped her hands together, as if in a posture of protecting herself.
"But I think you need to know something." She looked at Chen Mingsheng and said, "If you refuse to do anything, then I can't promise you anything."
You refused to promise, refused to meet my parents, and refused to tell the date of return.
Yang Zhao held his arm tightly with the hand that didn't hold the cigarette, and said, "Chen Mingsheng, it's your freedom to go or not, it's my freedom to wait or not."
Chen Mingsheng's face was pale, and the mental exhaustion of many days had accumulated to this point. Yang Zhao's words became the last straw, and he could hardly stand up.
He told himself in his mind that she was right, why should she wait for him. Chen Mingsheng lowered his head and saw his mutilated body, cheap clothes, and worn out crutches.
Why should she wait for him.
Chen Mingsheng took a few deep breaths, leaned on his crutches and turned his back, and said in a low voice, "You don't have to wait for me, Yang Zhao..."
He bent down to pick up the coat on the sofa, and walked slowly towards the door.
"If you have other... other people you like, don't worry about me." Chen Mingsheng walked to the door and opened the door. With his last breath of strength, he finished speaking.
Yang Zhao looked at his slightly bent back, watched him sit on the ground by the door, put on his shoes, then opened the door and left the room.
She felt all her strength being sucked away.
Yang Zhao sat down and stared blankly at the sofa opposite.
The room was quiet, as usual.
She suddenly realized that the seat she was sitting in was the place where she saw his sleeping face for the first time.
At that time, she also sat up from this position, while Chen Mingsheng was sitting on the sofa opposite, falling asleep.
The shadow of the past seemed to appear in front of Yang Zhao's eyes.
He closed his eyes, folded his arms, and bowed his head. There were faint nasolabial folds on his lips, his lips were tightly closed, and even his brows were slightly wrinkled.
At that time, she wondered if this man was dreaming.
Something happened in the dream that made him nervous, so he didn't smile in the dream.
Things that were so ordinary at the beginning, but looking back now, make people want to cry.
Yang Zhao wanted to think rationally about why she had to bear this.
She obviously just enjoys his body, in a dark swamp, she obviously only sees * with nothing to worry about.
But why now, she feels this way.
Yang Zhao finally realized that she had been firmly bound by the vines protruding from the mud.
Chen Mingsheng's car was parked a little far away. Holding on to his crutches, he walked in the direction of the car. When passing a street light, he suddenly heard the sound of a door opening behind him.
Chen Mingsheng turned his head and saw a person running out of the unit door and running up to him.
She gritted her teeth, as if she had endured to the extreme, but she still didn't yell loudly, she looked at him with eyes like knives.
Chen Mingsheng suddenly hugged her tightly, Yang Zhao's body looked a little thin in his embrace. On top of her head, he asked the words that had been kept in his heart—
"Yang Zhao, if I come back, can you give me another chance?"
Yang Zhao's face was buried in his chest, she didn't speak, but she stretched out her hand and hugged him back.
She said: "Chen Mingsheng, you bastard..."
Chen Mingsheng laughed, Yang Zhao didn't know how to curse, and the one she scolded the most was a jerk.
He quietly felt the gentle hands on his back.
Sure enough, he thought.
This woman is his support and his greatest reliance.
There was an indescribable feeling in his heart, which was something he would never have felt when he was carrying out the mission before.
He will come back, he will definitely come back, back to this woman.
"Trust me." He whispered, "I've been doing this for more than ten years, and it's dangerous, but it's just that."
He helped Yang Zhao away, looked her in the eyes, and said, "It's mainly because my former colleague had some problems at work, and I also made some troubles here, so I need to go back and deal with it."
Yang Zhao whispered, "When are you leaving?"
Chen Mingsheng said, "It's the closest."
Without saying anything, Yang Zhao took out a card from his pocket and handed it to Chen Mingsheng.
"Take it."
Chen Mingsheng looked at the card, "What is this for?"
Yang Zhao said, "I'll let you hold it."
"Need not."
"Chen Mingsheng." Yang Zhao's voice was cold, he narrowed his eyes slightly, and looked at the man in front of him, "I said, I'll let you hold it."
Chen Mingsheng reached out to take it.
"Chen Mingsheng, I know you have your own principles for doing things, but," Yang Zhao pursed his lips, and said, "Not everything in this world has only one solution. If you need to spend money, you must tell I."
Chen Mingsheng looked at the silver bank card, which was a Bank of China savings card. He shook the card jokingly and said, "How much money is in it."
But when his eyes met Yang Zhao's, he couldn't continue his half-joke.
Yang Zhao was very nervous, her face was paler than usual, her breathing was a little short, she just looked at him straight.
Chen Mingsheng held Yang Zhao's hand and said, "What I said is true. It's not that scary. Don't be like this. Work hard. I'll be back soon after you've finished your work."
Yang Zhao opened his mouth, wanting to say something else, when Chen Mingsheng's cell phone rang.
Chen Mingsheng answered the phone, "Wen Lei?"
"Oh, yes, I see."
The call ended quickly, Chen Mingsheng put down his phone and said, "I... I'm leaving tonight."
Yang Zhao said, "Well, can I contact you?"
Chen Mingsheng hesitated for a moment, then shook his head.
"knew."
Chen Mingsheng looked at Yang Zhao and said, "But don't worry, I will contact you when I have time."
Yang Zhao nodded, and Chen Mingsheng said, "Then...then I'm leaving."
"Um."
Chen Mingsheng got into the car, Yang Zhao stood by the window, she looked into Chen Mingsheng's eyes, and finally said lightly: "Pay attention to your body, don't work too hard."
Chen Mingsheng smiled, rolled down the car window, wrapped his arms around Yang Zhao's neck, and kissed her lightly.
"I know."
The red taxi slowly drove out of the community, and Yang Zhaocai remembered that she seemed to have forgotten to say goodbye to him.