Diagnosis: Friend [Rebirth] - Chapter 35.1

Chapter 35.1

Tan Baozhu was over ten minutes late today. When she pushed the door open, Jiang Qing was propping her chin on her hand, watching the dark, ashen clouds outside the window. Hearing the movement, Jiang Qing turned around, only to see Tan Baozhu wearing her black dress again.

Jiang Qing asked, “Why are you late today?”

Tan Baozhu lowered her head as she placed her backpack on the table, saying expressionlessly, “Got beaten by my dad.”

She sat opposite Jiang Qing and rummaged through her bag for a bottle of povidone-iodine. Glancing at Jiang Qing, she unbuttoned her cuffs to reveal her arms. The sight of the alternating blue and purple bruises made Jiang Qing gasp, momentarily speechless.

Tan Baozhu let out a sharp laugh and pulled a cotton swab from a plastic bag to dip into the iodine. “If you’re scared stiff, move aside.”

She held her sleeve with one hand and the swab with the other, her movements awkward and clumsy. Jiang Qing watched for a second before saying, “Let me do it.”

Taking the swab and iodine from Tan Baozhu, Jiang Qing gently touched the bruised areas on the girl’s arm. The moment the swab made contact, Tan Baozhu instinctively sucked in a breath. Jiang Qing looked up for a second, her throat bobbing; eventually, she just pursed her lips and continued applying the medicine.

“Do you want to ask me why I don’t call the police?”

Hearing Tan Baozhu’s question, Jiang Qing shook her head. She already knew the reason from their last encounter. Everyone has their own choices; she wouldn’t try to persuade Tan Baozhu.

Tan Baozhu said, “I’m his only child. As long as I endure these years, his entire inheritance will be mine.”

Jiang Qing instinctively asked, “What about your mother?” Did she also tell Tan Baozhu to just endure it?

Tan Baozhu pouted. “They divorced a long time ago. I was five. They asked me who I wanted to go with. My dad had money, my mom didn’t. Choosing Dad meant losing maternal love; choosing Mom meant having no money.”

She stared blankly ahead.

“I resented my mom so much back then. It was just being hit a few times, cursed at a few times—why did she have to divorce? Why make me face such a choice when I could have had both? She had no money, yet she still fought for my custody.”

Her arm was suddenly pressed a bit too hard, and Tan Baozhu hissed, inhaling sharply. She smiled. “Luckily, I said I wanted my dad. I didn’t want Mom. Mom is bad.”

“See, she’s such a hypocritical person. Before the lawsuit, she kept saying she loved me, but after I was awarded to my dad, she never came to see me again.”

“Turns out my choice was right. My dad got richer and richer, and she got poorer and poorer. She found a useless man to live with and had a useless child. The whole family is squeezed into a tiny apartment of a few dozen square meters. It couldn’t be more hilarious.”

Tan Baozhu giggled, her whole body trembling with the laughter. After laughing for a while, two distinct lines appeared at the corners of her mouth. She arched an eyebrow at Jiang Qing. “Do you know which neighborhood she lives in now?”

Jiang Qing felt that Tan Baozhu’s mental state was concerning, so she didn’t answer.

Tan Baozhu answered herself: “It’s the same neighborhood Jian Wenxin lives in. Those apartments are tiny, definitely not more than eighty square meters. A family of three actually lives there. I went to see her last time, and she and her daughter were actually playing on the swings in the complex. So dirty… outdoors, with so many people having sat on them.”

Jiang Qing kept her head down; the iodine stain gradually spread over the wound.

Tan Baozhu became increasingly excited as she spoke. “I bet she definitely regrets it. If she hadn’t brought up the divorce with my dad back then—”

“Then she would have been beaten to death by your father, and after her death, her daughter would have called her incompetent.” Jiang Qing couldn’t help but interrupt.

Tan Baozhu froze for a moment. “No, I would have protected her.”

Jiang Qing stood up to clear the table. “So many years have passed, and you’re still slandering your mother. How much truth do you think is in that ‘I would have protected her’?” She stepped on the trash can pedal and tossed the supplies away.

Behind her, Tan Baozhu suddenly said, “Don’t act so righteous, pretending to be a model student and criticizing me from a moral high ground. You aren’t me; what right do you have to criticize me?”

Different values cannot be forced together. Jiang Qing nodded and opened the test paper Tan Baozhu had done yesterday. “Alright, let’s start the lesson.”

Tan Baozhu let out a light laugh and pulled a pen from her bag. “Jiang Qing, I’ve been to Xiaoyang Village. I know your mother cheated and ran off with another man. She didn’t want you anymore.”

She sat at the table, fingers lightly pinching the pen. In less than a second, the pen was spinning nimbly between her fingertips.

Jiang Qing’s face stiffened for a moment. She retorted, “She didn’t cheat and run off with a man.”

Tan Baozhu smiled nonchalantly. “Whatever. Bottom line is, she didn’t want you.”

Jiang Qing’s throat bobbed. Her red pen drew a line on the paper. Suddenly, she heard Tan Baozhu ask, “Do you love her?”

Jiang Qing kept her head down, writing a formula next to the red line.

“I love her,” Tan Baozhu blinked, speaking with forced solemnity. “She’s so bad, yet I still love her.” She added, “I really am a Bodhisattva.”

Jiang Qing looked up, her mouth twitching in exasperation. She didn’t want to discuss this topic further, but the other girl was clearly excited and wouldn’t be able to study for a while. So, she shifted the topic to satisfy her curiosity: “You mentioned before that you were studying hard for a promise.”

Tan Baozhu nodded. “Mhm.”

Jiang Qing: “Who is it? Family? A friend? A teacher?”

Tan Baozhu scoffed and looked at Jiang Qing. “You think everyone is like you, obsessing over their teachers?”

Jiang Qing: “…”

Jiang Qing: “Those three categories were just examples. I just said it in passing.”

Tan Baozhu propped her chin, the pen never stopping its spin. “It’s her… my mom.”

Jiang Qing: “…?” Hating her, slandering her, and yet loving her and even sacrificing her summer for a promise—Jiang Qing’s mental age was older, but she truly couldn’t understand the complex, tangled love-hate emotions of a “chunibyo” teenager.

The long-brewing rain finally arrived. Raindrops slammed against the window, casting distinct dark shadows on the white walls. The papers on the desk scattered in the wind; Jiang Qing got up to close the window.

The downpour grew heavier, crackling against the glass. The heat brought by days of sunshine was swept away instantly. The withered, yellowed plants in the green belt were rejuvenated, their leaves washed into a vivid green.

The rain fell from morning until night. People’s initial joy turned into concern. The streets were washed clean, but low-lying areas saw water depths reaching 1.5 meters; the city’s drainage system seemed unable to cope. There was no sign of the rain stopping.

The damp air clung to her soft clothes. Water droplets exploded at her feet, splashing her ankles. A cold breeze blew through the rain; Jiang Qing shivered and then let out an uncontrollable sneeze.

A large crowd of people without umbrellas gathered under the small bus shelter. Whether getting on or off, everyone swarmed toward the shelter, making the already narrow space incredibly cramped. Jiang Qing had been standing in the middle, but as the crowd surged and the bus she was waiting for hadn’t arrived, she was pushed back until her back was pressed against the cold notice board.

The jostling continued. Jiang Qing frowned.

“Stop pushing in! What are you pushing for?! Such a small space and you’re still squeezing in? If you keep pushing, I’m going to hit someone!”

People in the crowd looked toward the voice. A gloomy-looking girl was leaning against the notice board with an impatient “I’m crazy and killing people isn’t a crime” expression. Her damp hair stuck to her pale face, giving her the aura of a ghost in a rainy night.

Those who looked back gulped and didn’t dare push further.

Tan Baozhu reached up to tuck her wet black hair behind her ear. The rain was endless, and there were no taxis nearby, forcing her to lower herself to squeeze onto a bus. The more she thought about it, the more annoyed she became, and she ended up clawing at her own face as she adjusted her hair. Red marks appeared instantly.

Jiang Qing felt a bit lightheaded, but she was still shocked. Was Tan Baozhu too hot-tempered, or just too cruel to herself? She looked at Tan Baozhu, genuinely worried about her mental state: “Doesn’t… doesn’t that hurt?”

When Tan Baozhu was annoyed, she was unpleasant to everyone. She glanced at Jiang Qing and said crossly, “There are so many places on my body that hurt; if I had to care about all of them, I’d die of the pain.”

Around them, people complained about the terrible weather. Fortunately, the bus Jiang Qing was waiting for arrived a few minutes later. She shook her head to clear the fog, fought her way out of the crowd, and boarded the bus.

The bus was just as crowded. Water covered the floor, and the driver’s roar to “Move to the back!” was incessant. Jiang Qing was lucky enough to find a spot by the window where she could hold onto a pole. Before she could steady herself, she felt someone familiar squeeze in next to her. She looked up—it was Tan Baozhu.

Jiang Qing shifted to give her some space, and the two stood face-to-face by the window. Outside, large raindrops pelted the leaves of the green belt. Rain washed over the glass, and as night fell, the various city lights blurred into smudges of color.

The streets were submerged, and the world seemed shrouded in a curtain of water—cold and misty.

A girl in a yellow dress stood quietly by the roadside holding an umbrella. In the hazy, gloomy weather, that yellow looked like a beam of sunlight falling from the clouds, exceptionally eye-catching. Her hair was slightly damp from the rain, sticking to her pale cheeks; her delicate face looked even more pitifully beautiful against the rain. Gu Yining looked at the traffic light at the crosswalk, then down at her chat interface—there were no new messages.

With such heavy rain, she wondered if Jiang Qing was stuck somewhere. The message had been sent five minutes ago and had gone unanswered. Fine rain fell on her phone screen; Gu Yining tried to wipe it away, but since her hands were wet, it only made the screen blurrier. She gave up.

As she was about to look up, a man’s hand suddenly entered her field of vision, holding a neatly folded handkerchief.

Under a black umbrella, the man smiled gently. “We meet again, Miss Gu.”

Seeing that she didn’t seem to recognize him, the man nodded slightly and introduced himself: “Miss Gu, my name is Cheng Er. We met at the banquet earlier.”

Across the curtain of rain, Gu Yining finally realized—this seemed to be the young master of the Cheng family, the man she had been engaged to in her previous life ten years ago.