Peerless Beauty – Chapter 82

Lipstick

You help me apply it

Jian Qing held the medical record folder, standing dazed in place.

            

The girl’s soft limbs clung to her, her arms like vines tightly wrapped around her.

Enveloped by the unfamiliar warmth, Jian Qing was dazed for several seconds before she reached out to embrace Lu Yinxi’s waist.

Lu Yinxi hugged her tightly, with days of consuming longing mixed with pity and heartache, wanting to pull her into her embrace and protect her without letting her suffer any more harm.

            

Jian Qing silently held Lu Yinxi, kissed the tip of her ear, and said nothing, her gaze gradually softening.

More and more eyes were cast in their direction.

Here, such an emotional embrace was not an uncommon sight.

            

Every day, separated lovers, relatives, and friends would reunite here, embracing and crying for their survival after a disaster.

After hugging for a while, Jian Qing remembered her white coat, which wasn’t very clean, and gently pushed Lu Yinxi away, holding her hand as they walked towards the internal medicine consultation room.

Here, with a shortage of staff, after finishing the ward rounds, one must sit in the consultation room to receive patients.

            

Almost all types of diseases from various departments need to be attended to.

The health conditions in the disaster area are backward, with many people experiencing abdominal bloating, diarrhea, vomiting, and skin itching. There are also patients transferred from the frontline, where emergency surgery conditions aren’t as good, resulting in some post-operative complications. People just dug out from the ruins may also suffer from crush syndrome.

When there are no patients temporarily, Jian Qing must seize the time to write medical records.

            

There are no resident doctors, graduate students, or interns here to command, so all medical records must be written personally, and there’s no electronic medical record system; everything is handwritten.

Lu Yinxi sits beside Jian Qing, keeping her company.

Jian Qing opens a drawer, unwraps a bag of milk candies, and stuffs a few candies into Lu Yinxi’s hand.

            

The field hospital has quite a few children coming for treatment, so she and the volunteers requested two bags of milk candies to give to crying young patients.

“I’m not a child anymore,” Lu Yinxi muttered, yet she still unwrapped the candy and put it in her mouth, then stared directly at Jian Qing.

She has become a bit darker and thinner, with a sharper chin.

            

Her long black hair, which once almost reached her waist, is now cut short to just past her shoulders, simply tied into a ponytail, with a bare face and no makeup.

All the women here have bare faces, and some who have just come from the disaster area can even be described as having “gray heads and dirt faces.”

The weather was hot, so her white coat was changed to short sleeves.

            

The long-sleeved white coat she wore when they departed was worn for fifteen days.

At that time, there were no supplies, no water, and no one could wash. Day after day, they dug people out and saved them, sweat sticking to their clothes, waiting for them to dry naturally. With continuous aftershocks at night, everyone slept in their clothes. After fifteen days, everyone’s white coats became too stiff to wear.

The medical team wanted to throw them away, but they were taken by the museum staff.

            

The museum staff said, these are not dirty clothes; these are your battle robes. They have commemorative value and should let the people of the disaster area remember your battle robes forever.

On her exposed arms and neck, there were a few shallow blood marks. Lu Yinxi reached out, gently touching those scars: “Does it hurt?”

Jian Qing said: “It doesn’t hurt anymore.”

            

“Are there any injuries?”

Jian Qing shook her head: “No, don’t worry.”

Lu Yinxi looked at her, softly responded with an “oh,” and after a while, walked out of the tent, squatted on the ground, and shed tears silently.

            

Jian Qing leaned over the table, writing medical records. After finishing a few, she walked out of the tent and unexpectedly saw the child at the doorway with red eyes.

She squatted down as well, touched Lu Yinxi’s forehead, and asked, “Why have you become a rabbit?”

Lu Yinxi sniffled, her eyelashes lowered, and didn’t speak.

            

She felt heartache for Jian Qing.

Jian Qing had become quiet again.

There was no expression on her face, and she seemed silent and gloomy, lifeless.

            

She looked very tired.

And very sad.

Jian Qing lowered her head to touch Lu Yinxi’s forehead and softly asked, “Does this look make you worry?”

            

Lu Yinxi softly responded with a “hmm.”

Jian Qing was silent for a while, then comforted the child: “Don’t be afraid, don’t worry.”

She is not so fragile, just needs time to calm down.

            

Give her some time, and she will slowly recover.

Lu Yinxi embraced her neck, leaned in, lightly pecked her forehead, then stood up and said: “I have to go teach the students now! I’m currently a temporary art teacher for primary school students. In 45 minutes, when class is over, I’ll come back to find you.”

She was originally assigned to the field hospital cafeteria to cook as a volunteer. One day, she noticed a few children sitting in the corner dazing, so she went over to chat with them and drew small animals to cheer them up. The passing secretary saw this and arranged for her to teach art classes at the temporary school.

            

There is a group of primary school students resuming classes after the earthquake. Some students lost their parents and family, while others witnessed the corpses of classmates, sitting expressionless in the classroom without communicating with others.

People with medical-related knowledge can all determine that they need post-disaster psychological intervention.

Mental health experts from across the country rushed to the disaster area to provide psychological intervention for the post-disaster survivors. College students majoring in psychology from various universities also signed up as volunteers to chat with adults and play games with children.

            

Jump rope, eagle catches the chick, and hopscotch—these familiar childhood games—Lu Yinxi played with those children over and over again.

She played with the children and led them in drawing, but also kept a proper distance to prevent the children from transferring emotions and developing dependency on her.

She cannot stay here for long, so she cannot form deep bonds with these children to avoid causing them secondary psychological harm when she leaves.

            

This is the same principle as visiting welfare institutions or orphanages. One can show goodwill, but should not build emotional dependence. When leaving, embracing each other and crying loudly is not a touching scene but rather unprofessional behavior.

After class, Lu Yinxi went to the field hospital’s internal medicine department to find Jian Qing and have lunch together.

This area is all disaster victim settlement points, with a temporary government, temporary schools, and a field hospital. All disaster victims live with their families in tents, and the government provides free meals for a limited time each day.

            

Occasionally, disaster victims complain that the meals are not good enough, lacking meat, or having too little meat.

In the field hospital and among the stationed troops, there is a special canteen, stocked with supplies transferred from rear hospitals and troops, as well as rice and vegetables brought by farmers from afar, who say they are personally grown and shouldn’t let the People’s Liberation Army and doctors go hungry.

Jian Qing had eaten compressed biscuits and instant noodles for half a month at the front, so now even plain rice and greens taste very good to her.

            

The elderly and children can also have a boiled egg. The old master serving food in the canteen, who saw Lu Yinxi helping out in the canteen a few days ago, also gave her an egg, saying: “Girl, nourish your body.”

Lu Yinxi accepted with a smile, peeled the egg, and placed it on Jian Qing’s plate: “You eat, to replenish nutrition.”

Jian Qing remembered how, in the hospital canteen, Lu Yinxi liked to take shredded chicken from her plate. Zhang Yue saw this and teased, saying it wasn’t a famine era, just a few pieces of meat being taken back and forth. If you like it, just get more from the aunt, acting like a pair of lovey-dovey young lovers.

            

Now, truly facing a national crisis, with resources scarce, the girl in front of her prefers to give the good things to her.

She used clean chopsticks to divide the peeled boiled egg into two, saying: “Half for each person.”

At night, Lu Yinxi rested in Jian Qing’s tent.

            

The field hospital’s tent had a bed and soft bedding.

On the front line, their sleeping bags were soaked by rain and pressed to the bottom of ruins by aftershocks. At that time, roads were blocked, and supplies couldn’t come in. In the following days, if it didn’t rain, they lay on the ground to sleep. Once heavy rain came, they crawled into body bags to avoid the rain and sleep.

Now, Jian Qing could hold Lu Yinxi in her arms to sleep. Lu Yinxi felt hot and didn’t want to be held, struggled twice, couldn’t break free, so she just let her be.

            

The skin on her arm felt cool and soft, quite comfortable to touch.

Jian Qing lifted her eyelids, glanced at her, grabbed her restless hand, and pressed it into the bedding, saying: “Very sleepy, don’t make trouble.”

She responded with an “oh,” obediently, and did not bother Jian Qing.

            

In the middle of the night, the arm holding her suddenly tightened, startling her awake. She opened her eyes, turned around, and stroked Jian Qing’s face, feeling the tightly furrowed brow.

She smoothed that brow, then secretly kissed Jian Qing’s brows and eyes, waiting for the tightly gripping arm to gradually loosen its hold.

One night, Lu Yinxi was startled awake like this two or three times, and the next day, she had two dark circles under her eyes.

            

Jian Qing, puzzled, lightly poked her dark circles and asked, “Why have you become a panda?”

Lu Yinxi looked at her, lightly hummed, didn’t speak, and went to play games with the students.

The doctors at the field hospital are also occasionally sent to the countryside for clinic visits.

            

Some villagers in the countryside are unwilling to come to the city’s disaster victim settlement points to live, so they just stay by the ruins at night and are busy harvesting crops in the fields during the day.

An earthquake killed many people, but the living still need to survive, still remember their own farmland, and are unwilling to leave that piece of life-sustaining land.

Doctors can only carry their medicine boxes, go to the countryside, treat their illnesses, and incidentally conduct some health education work on epidemic prevention and earthquake preparedness.

            

Jian Qing set off at six in the morning and returned only at nine in the evening.

After returning, she handed over her work, checked on the patients, and called Lu Yinxi to the dormitory.

Lu Yinxi asked her with a smile: “What for? Did you pick wildflowers from the countryside to give to me?”

            

Jian Qing shook her head, took out a lipstick from her pocket, and placed it in Lu Yinxi’s palm: “Bought it while passing by the mall.”

Here, people are dusty-faced and barefaced, with no mind for dressing up.

But her little girl loves beauty.

            

Lu Yinxi pinched the lipstick and waved it under the tent’s light.

The light was somewhat dim and yellow, not as bright as the sick ward and operating room.

Lu Yinxi stood under the light and smiled, saying: “I haven’t used this for many days… alright, tonight I’ll secretly apply it once.” She twisted open the lipstick cap and handed the lipstick to Jian Qing, “You help me apply it.”

            

Jian Qing took the lipstick, lifted Lu Yinxi’s chin, and her gaze fell on Lu Yinxi’s red lips.

The corners of her lips carried a smile, the lips were full and soft, with a smooth lip line, a beautiful lip shape set against her fair skin, like a delicate flower blooming in the snow.

The lipstick was slowly applied along the lip peak, outlining the upper lip. Lu Yinxi pressed her lips together, while Jian Qing held her face, staring at her lips.

            

As the lipstick was about to touch the lower lip, Jian Qing’s action suddenly paused. Then the lipstick in her hand turned, and she casually applied it on her own lower lip, then lowered her head, moved a bit closer, turned her face, and kissed Lu Yinxi’s lips.

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The author has something to say:

Why do I always finish writing at 1 o’clock? Does writing also have a biological clock? No way, I need to adjust it a bit~~~

            

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