Diagnosis: Friend [Rebirth] - Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Zhou Xuening sat on the sofa for a long time. Her laptop remained on the table, and the transparent bag containing a few strands of hair lay beside it.

The girl opposite her had long since departed. A waiter stepped forward to ask the woman if she needed any further service.

After obtaining a palm-sized transparent self-sealing bag, Zhou Xuening thanked the waiter and stood up to walk to the opposite sofa. The indentation on the milky-white sofa had already fully rebounded, leaving only a few stray hairs as proof that someone had been sitting there not long ago.

Zhou Xuening leaned down, picked up the hairs, and carefully placed them inside the bag.

After getting off the bus, Jiang Qing walked along the small path toward the school gate. High stone walls towered on both sides of the alley; inside the wall to the left was the school, and outside the wall to the right was a mosque.

The sounds of prayer and recitation drifted from the other side of the wall. As she was about to exit the alley, the aroma of barbecue from the stalls in front of the school’s back gate wafted over from a distance, making her stomach growl.

Just as she was about to step onto the road leading to the back gate, Jiang Qing suddenly felt movement behind her. The next instant, a pair of slender hands appeared below her field of vision, quickly covering her mouth and nose and dragging her into a side alley.

“Classmate, it’s me. I’m Gu Yining.” The person behind her was breathing heavily, her footsteps somewhat erratic.

Jiang Qing had stopped struggling long ago. A few seconds after those hands had touched her, she already knew the person behind her was Gu Yining. Having lived with Gu Yining for so long, Jiang Qing could identify her instantly from her breathing rhythm and the scale of her movements.

Gu Yining let go and pulled her into another crowded, narrow alley. On both sides were dilapidated low houses with white paint crudely covering the stones, and plenty of moss growing in the corners. It was said that this area was slated for demolition soon, and the land would be used to expand No. 2 High School.

Gu Yining reached out her hand: “Classmate Jiang, where’s my card?”

Jiang Qing shifted her backpack to her front, took the SD card out from the innermost layer of the main compartment, and handed it to Gu Yining. Her observant gaze landed on Gu Yining’s face; Jiang Qing noticed her complexion was poor, carrying a hint of weak paleness.

Jiang Qing asked: “Are you okay?”

Gu Yining was looking down, inserting the card into her phone. She paused upon hearing this, then continued her movements a moment later: “I’m fine.” Realizing that the probing gaze was still fixed on her face, Gu Yining raised her hand to rub the tip of her nose. “Oh… I’m on my period. I feel a bit unwell.”

Setting aside the fact that Gu Yining was usually physically strong and had regular cycles, in the ten-plus years they were together, Jiang Qing had never heard Gu Yining say she suffered from menstrual cramps. But that little habit of rubbing her nose whenever she lied to Jiang Qing was truly the same as it had been for ten years—it never changed.

Jiang Qing’s gaze slid down Gu Yining’s cheek to her neck, then past the oversized school uniform to her forearms where the sleeves were rolled up; there were no marks there.

However, in many cases, bullies would specifically use methods that left no traces, causing the victim double the agony.

“I looked at the contents of the card.”

The dark screen lit up as the second-hand knockoff phone played its startup animation. Gu Yining looked up at her, squinting her eyes slightly.

Jiang Qing asked: “What do you plan to do?”

Gu Yining said: “The evidence is here. I’ll tell the teachers. If that doesn’t work, I’ll report it anonymously to the District Bureau of Education, then the City Bureau. If they don’t care, I’ll keep going higher.”

Her words still carried the naivety characteristic of this age.

“Gu Yining,” Jiang Qing said, “You are a student of No. 9. You know better than I do that if telling the teachers worked, it wouldn’t be your turn to be the one collecting evidence.”

She stepped closer to Gu Yining, meeting her evasive gaze: “How do you plan to report to the Bureau of Education? Email? Or putting the SD card in an envelope and sneaking it to their door at night?”

Jiang Qing continued: “If you successfully get an email address, then I’m telling you, it might go two or three months without anyone looking at it. Government personnel rarely use emails for official business these days, let alone files from an unknown source—few people would even click on them… Even so, you can still try.”

“If it’s an envelope with an SD card, I suggest you don’t do it. One must always be on guard. The people who can act with such impunity at No. 9 have chains of money and power behind them that you and I cannot imagine. Obtaining surveillance footage is no difficult task for them.” She paused. “Moreover, before things blow up, no one wants to go looking for extra work.”

“Blow up? What do you mean by blow up?” Gu Yining tilted her head. “Does someone have to die for it to count as blowing up? But students have jumped off buildings at school in previous years, and it never blew up.”

She seemed to lose her spirit and squatted down against the wall. Jiang Qing squatted down with her and asked softly: “Besides you, is anyone else being bullied?”

“There are plenty of them.” Gu Yining looked at Jiang Qing. “Different classes, different grades, different genders—they’re everywhere. It would actually be abnormal if there weren’t any… but if we’re talking about someone serious, it’s Su Xiaoting from our class.”

“Do you have evidence?” Thinking that all the evidence Gu Yining had collected was likely on the SD card, Jiang Qing asked again, “Can you film evidence?”

Gu Yining shook her head.

“…I can’t film it. It’s the boys who do it; they drag her into the men’s restroom. There are many of them, and I don’t dare go in. I’ve asked her privately, and she only says they make fun of her.”

A silence fell over the narrow alley.

After a long while, Jiang Qing spoke: “Wait a bit longer.”

Gu Yining asked: “Wait for what?”

“Wait for the right moment,” Jiang Qing explained. “I made a copy of the contents and gave it to an acquaintance. She will handle it. In the meantime, you just need to protect yourself.”

Gu Yining raised her dark eyes, a smile curling at the corner of her mouth: “How am I supposed to trust you? What if you take my things, run to those people, and report me?”

Gu Yining rested her elbows on her knees and her chin in her palms: “Or, what if that acquaintance of yours reports me without any regard for whether I live or die?”

In the next instant, a cold hand touched Gu Yining’s wrist. She shivered from the chill, then heard Jiang Qing say: “If you didn’t trust me, you wouldn’t have given me the card. As for that acquaintance, you can rest assured; she is a good person, a philanthropist involved in the scholarship program. Her name is Zhou Xuening.”

“Ah?” Gu Yining was puzzled. “You’re just telling me her information like that?”

Jiang Qing smiled at her: “Because I don’t just trust her—I trust you, too.”

Those cold hands finally let go, but a strange sensation lingered in Gu Yining’s mind: this was only their third time meeting; did this person truly have such great trust in her? This matter originally had nothing to do with her, and she could have completely ignored it.

Gu Yining voiced her doubt. Jiang Qing froze for a moment, her expression becoming somewhat unnatural: “Maybe… because… I’m a good person? After all, as a student of No. 2, one must have the right values.”

Gu Yining scoffed, “You’re quite good at advertising for your school.”

She beckoned to Jiang Qing, “Got a phone?”

Jiang Qing didn’t know what she wanted to do, but she fished her phone out of her pocket and handed it over. Using the buttons on the old phone was a hassle; it took Gu Yining a long time of laborious pressing to find the contacts section, enter her own mobile number, and hit dial. The phone in her own pocket began to chime.

Gu Yining returned the phone to Jiang Qing, stood up, and looked down at her with a smile: “That’s my number.”

Jiang Qing gripped the phone. On the tiny screen, the harsh light displayed Gu Yining’s name, and the casing still held a lingering warmth. She pressed the button to turn off the screen and stood up against the wall.

Before she could steady herself, her head and body felt as if they were being filled with heavy lead. Her vision went dark, and her body fell uncontrollably.

Someone seemed to catch her—it must have been Gu Yining… Jiang Qing leaned against that warm body and rested for a good while. Gradually, her vision returned, and the heaviness in her body and brain slowly faded.

“Do you have low blood sugar?”

In just that short moment, Jiang Qing’s originally healthy, ruddy lips had taken on a frosty hue. Her lips moved slightly: “A little. Mostly from squatting too long…”

Before Jiang Qing could finish her sentence, she heard a faint crinkling sound, and then a piece of candy was pressed against her mouth. Following the sweet and sour fragrance, Jiang Qing looked down.

The colorful fruit candy wrapper had been peeled open, and a translucent, round candy sat in the middle. Gu Yining’s palm held the wrapper: “Eat some candy to feel better.”

Jiang Qing looked at that candy wrapper and remembered the past.

The past of her and Gu Yining.

Jiang Qing had poor circulation and disliked exercise; low blood sugar was a common occurrence. Gu Yining always carried candy in her pockets—all kinds, beautiful, novel ones. Even when dressed in a business suit and sitting upright in a formal setting, the next moment Gu Yining would pull her hand over.

No one knew that the young miss of the Gu family had secretly placed a piece of candy in her palm. That candy tickled Jiang Qing’s palm, making it itch. The effect of the candy was also great; even before she ate it, a shallow smile would already be curling at the corners of her mouth.

Someone passed by the small alley, their footsteps approaching and then slowly fading away. The voice of a vendor hawking goods, accompanied by a few clinks of metal striking metal, drifted over the stone wall, sounding indistinct by the time it reached their ears.

Jiang Qing lowered her head and took the candy into her mouth.

It was very sweet.

One side of her cheek bulged out around the candy like a little frog. Before long, her cheek and mouth moved as she quickly crushed the candy and swallowed it.

Jiang Qing said: “Thank you, Classmate Gu.”

“Hmm?” Gu Yining frowned in dissatisfaction. “‘Classmate Gu’ sounds so distant. Just call me by my name, or call me A-Ning. Qingqing.”

Her tone rose at the end; Gu Yining seemed very satisfied with the name “Qingqing.”

The sweetness still clung to her throat. Jiang Qing swallowed and asked: “Why… do you like calling me Qingqing?”

Jiang Qing’s name consisted of two characters and was easy to say. Most teachers and friends around her called her “Jiang Qing,” while a few called her “Xiao Qing.” Only Gu Yining took tireless pleasure in calling her “Qingqing.”

“Qingqing, Qingqing.”

Sometimes unable to stand her constant chattering, Jiang Qing would pick up a nearby pillow and hurl it at Gu Yining, intending to make her shut up. To her surprise, Gu Yining was quick and caught the pillow, throwing it back at her. Thus, a pillow fight would begin.

When they were tired of playing, the two would lie haphazardly on the bed. Gu Yining’s head would rest on Jiang Qing’s waist, and Gu Yining would grab Jiang Qing’s hands, holding them up high as she stubbornly compared their sizes. Their hands were about the same size, a fact Gu Yining had compared many times before.

Gu Yining would giggle, her fingers sliding into the gaps between Jiang Qing’s, interlacing them. Looking up at Jiang Qing leaning against the blanket, she would whisper: “Qingqing.”

Jiang Qing would laugh and scold her: “Gu Yining, you’re crazy.”

But Gu Yining wasn’t the one who was sick.

It was Jiang Qing who had fallen ill.