Cold War
It’s better to just break it off like this.
Time passed second by second. The bright white light in the living room became somewhat glaring after a while. Lu Yinxi closed her eyes to rest a bit; her legs had grown numb from standing for too long, so she shifted her stance.
Jian Qing leaned against the back of the door, separated from Lu Yinxi by a wall.
She recalled how they were laughing and chatting just this morning. How could she be acting so coy with her while planning to leave her side?
Are all those actors like this, showing one face publicly and another privately?
Lu Yinxi stood outside the door for a long time, never mustering the courage to knock. In the end, she took out her phone.
All of Jian Qing’s accounts on chat apps were pinned at the top.
Originally, Jian Qing was worried that Lu Yinxi’s body housed two personalities. She feared that if the other personality awoke, it wouldn’t remember this period of time and would be confused and panicked. So she pinned all contact methods at the top and added the note “Doctor,” hoping she could reach her immediately.
Jian Qing’s profile picture was a blank image, without text or expression, just a white background.
Lu Yinxi gently stroked that blank profile picture and opened the chat box.
There were 26 letters on the keyboard. She pieced together, deleted, and wrote a sentence:
【I did not treat this place as a relay station.】
She wanted to send it but suddenly felt it lacked persuasiveness.
She added: 【You are very important to me.】
The next second, she felt it was too sentimental and deleted the latter sentence.
Her mood was like a half-filled bucket of water swaying in the air, rocking back and forth, up and down.
Her fingertip hesitated to press the send button. Lu Yinxi just swiped back and forth on the screen, checking the past chat records.
They spent every day together, usually speaking face to face, rarely sending messages. The chat record was from half a month ago.
Suddenly, the screen vibrated.
Lu Yinxi held her breath and stared intently. On the chat interface, it prominently displayed a sentence: 【I patted ‘Jian Qing’】
—She accidentally tapped Jian Qing’s profile picture.
Tapping the profile picture twice will automatically shake the chat window and then pop up a “tap” message.
Lu Yinxi stared intently at the phone screen, waiting for half a minute, but there was no response from the other side.
Jian Qing always carried her phone with her, but she would only check it immediately if a call came in. She usually ignored vibrations and message tones.
She probably hasn’t seen it yet…
Lu Yinxi pressed the recall button.
Jian Qing saw that shaking message, her expression lightened slightly, and she stared at the screen for a while. Just as she was about to reply with a question mark, she watched as the message disappeared from the screen.
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Expressionless, she turned off the screen and went to the bathroom to take a shower.
Lu Yinxi, wearing slippers, paced back and forth outside her door. After much hesitation, she finally sent the message:【I did not treat this place as a relay station. You are very important to me.】
After sending it, she didn’t dare look at the reply, put away her phone, and retreated to her room to curl up.
She knew it was a feeble explanation, but she still hoped for a response.
Jian Qing was not someone who would see a message and not reply.
Lu Yinxi waited from 10:30 PM to 11:30 PM, a full hour, but still did not see a reply from Jian Qing.
She threw aside her phone, stopped waiting, washed up, and prepared to sleep.
The next morning, her phone screen still only had her own message.
Yesterday, Jian Qing said she would take her to see the house near the university town. When she woke up in the morning, she didn’t see her figure.
Lu Yinxi waited at home for a while but didn’t wait for her to come back. She also went out to find a real estate agency.
Lu Yinxi was very familiar with the process of renting a house. During her time in Beijing, she had rented basements, slept in tiny partitions, initially renting houses by looking at rental ads on the walls, avoiding extra agency fees. Later, after signing with a company, she moved into a company-arranged dormitory, four people in a room, taking turns to shower. Then, she had her own house, gradually gaining a foothold in that circle.
The original owner was as weak as a dodder flower, needing to rely on others to survive; she was not.
Even if she couldn’t return to her own world, she could still live independently in this one.
The agent took her through the city’s streets and alleys. Lu Yinxi meticulously recorded the houses she viewed, occasionally glancing at her phone to see if she had received a reply from Jian Qing.
The chat interface still only had her own message.
The longer she waited, the colder her heart became. Her anxious emotions were overtaken by thoughts of despair.
Lu Yinxi couldn’t help but wonder if Jian Qing didn’t care about her at all. What did it mean to leave her hanging like this?
She simply deleted the chat record to avoid seeing it and feeling upset.
The university town was adjacent to the suburbs, with several streets nearby belonging to various campuses.
The housekeeper had cleaned up the house. Jian Qing paid her and moved a few pots of green plants that Lu Yinxi liked from the car, arranging them one by one. She made the house look a bit more lived-in before driving back to the city.
When she got home, the house was empty.
Her heart was in her throat.
She went to check Lu Yinxi’s room and saw that her belongings were still there, which eased her anxiety a bit. Then she went to the kitchen to prepare dinner.
Dinner was ready, but Lu Yinxi hadn’t come back yet. Jian Qing sat on the sofa waiting for her.
She somewhat regretted testing her.
It would have been better to pretend not to know anything and maintain the illusion of peace and happiness. What was this situation now?
She was older than her and should have been more accommodating, more tolerant, and taken the initiative. But her pride and self-respect wouldn’t allow her to budge.
From beginning to end, she couldn’t understand what she had done wrong, where she hadn’t done well enough, why she had to leave, or if it had all been just a game from the start.
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The sound of a key turning in the lock came from the door. Jian Qing looked towards the sound, and Lu Yinxi entered from outside.
Jian Qing didn’t like wearing outer coats into the living room, so there was a coat rack at the entrance. Everyone who came in had to take off their coat.
Sometimes, when she came back from the hospital, she would even hang those coats on the balcony to sun them.
Lu Yinxi followed her habit; the first thing she did upon entering was to take off her coat.
There was someone in the living room.
Lu Yinxi unbuttoned her coat, one button at a time, very slowly.
She didn’t know how to face Jian Qing.
She had a gentle personality, always polite to everyone, seldom holding grudges. From childhood to adulthood, whenever she had conflicts with friends, it was usually the friends who took the initiative to make up.
When she had conflicts with her mother, Gu Mingyu, Gu Mingyu was busy with work and didn’t bother with her. Usually, after a month or two, her anger would subside. She would still call her “Mom” because blood ties are a natural bond.
Even when she was angry with Gu Mingyu for five years, she never intended to sever ties permanently. She was just waiting for Gu Mingyu to admit her mistake first, and then she would obediently call her “Mom.”
Now, let alone waiting for Gu Mingyu to apologize, she didn’t even know if she could return to her original world.
In all her past, scarce intimate relationships, Lu Yinxi couldn’t extract any experience in handling conflicts or taking the initiative to reconcile.
No problem, even without experience, she could try for the first time.
She didn’t want to lose Jian Qing; she cared about her.
With this firm thought, Lu Yinxi walked into the living room. Just as her lips began to smile, she saw the sofa was empty.
She had gone back to her room.
Not even giving the opportunity to communicate proactively.
Lu Yinxi pinched her own cheeks, wiping away the smile at the corners of her lips.
She walked to the dining table.
Two dishes and a soup, untouched.
All day, she had been occupied by negative emotions, and Lu Yinxi had no appetite. She stood on the balcony for a while, watering the green plants and wiping the leaves.
She hoped Jian Qing would come out and accompany her as usual.
Even if they did nothing and said nothing, just having her by her side would let her know she was cared for.
But she wore thin clothes and stood in the cold wind for half an hour, even sneezing loudly, yet that person never came out to check on her.
Lu Yinxi finally realized how foolish it was to joke with her own body.
She thought she should have a good cry and then forget about Jian Qing, but at this moment, she found she couldn’t cry.
The other party didn’t care about her, so she didn’t want to cry, nor did she want to lower her head and proactively make up.
It was as if crying would mean losing.
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She nonchalantly returned to her room, watched movies, played on her phone, and tried to divert her attention.
She watched a highly-rated comedy, but Lu Yinxi watched it from start to finish without showing a hint of a smile.
She couldn’t muster any interest in anything; the feeling of stagnation and sadness weighed heavily on her heart.
She hadn’t even been in a relationship, yet she felt as if she had unilaterally experienced a breakup.
Feeling extremely sad, all the beautiful memories of their time together were covered in dust, thrown far away. Lu Yinxi despairingly thought, it was a relationship that shouldn’t have started, a relationship with no future. It would be better to just end it like this, let no one care about anyone, not even be friends…
The food on the dining table was neglected for a night. When Jian Qing woke up in the morning, she leaned her hands on the edge of the table, staring expressionlessly at the plates for a while, then dumped all the leftover food into the trash can.
The beginning of the year, like the end, was the busiest time for hospital check-ups.
In the morning, the medical insurance office came to check the insurance, urging an increase in bed turnover rates, communicating with patients who had been hospitalized for too long, and discharging them as soon as possible. They repeatedly emphasized not exceeding the medical insurance fund quota, as any excess would have to be borne by the department itself. The medical affairs department and the quality control department came to check medical records, deducting points for any defects. Leaders from the health commission’s medical administration department also came for a round of inspections, checking for compliance with legal practices.
The ward was bustling, with patients to attend to on one side and various inspections to handle on the other.
No one’s personal emotions could be considered. Lu Yinxi was pulled by the head nurse to decorate the facade, sparing her the awkwardness of direct contact with Jian Qing.
Jian Qing was busy in the ward, too busy to step away. She habitually made coffee for her and suddenly thought she hadn’t eaten breakfast.