The Complete Collection of Qiongyao 8 -- Golden Camellia

Author: Qiong Yao
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-07-01
Features: Excerpt from the book:
"Rain drips outside the curtain, the spring fades. Han Peiyin stands by the window, gazing at the misty rain outside. The weeds in the small courtyard have grown again. These days, there's simply no time or mood to tidy up the little garden. At the corner of the wall, a hibiscus flower sways gently in the rain. On its drooping branches, a lone yellow flower hangs, giving a sense of fragility and loneliness. I fear this weather, I fear this rainy season, I fear this late spring, and I fear this chilly morning. Every new day is just a continuation of the old ones. If there's no expectation or novelty in life, she truly doesn't know why the years roll by day after day. Yesterday, she received a wedding invitation from Yu Songheng. The invitation had a small note: 'Peiyin, if you dare not attend my wedding, none of us sisters will attend your wedding!' Yu Songheng is finally getting married too. In high school, she said she would embrace the life of a spinster: 'I won't marry those stinking boys!' Now, the boys are no longer stinking, and they will become her lifelong companion and support. Of course, Yu Songheng is also twenty-five this year. The gap between twenty-five and sixteen or seventeen is indeed long. What they do, think, and feel will no longer be the same. Twenty-five! Peiyin startled. Two years ago, she attended Yu Songping's wedding. Now it's Yu Songheng, and next, who will be it? Yu Songrui? No, Songrui is still a child. When Peiyin and Songheng were high school classmates, Songrui was still in elementary school! But now? Songrui is also in her second year of college! How can time pass so quickly? She stared blankly at the window glass, her mind a mess, thinking about the three sisters of the Yu family. She seemed to have never thought about herself. The glass was fogged with the warm breath she exhaled, obscuring the view outside the window. Subconsciously, she raised her hand and wrote a number on the fog: '26'. 26, then another, and another. With no thought or purpose, she kept repeating the number until her mother's voice sharp in the bedroom: 'Peiyin! Peiyin!'
'Oh!' she mumbled, turning around and running to her mother's room. In the last moment of walking to her mother's room, she glanced at her window again. Only then did she faintly realize that 26 was her age this year! As soon as she entered her mother's room, the dim, damp, and distinctive smell of medicine, alcohol, and mold from the hospital room greeted her. Her mother's thin arms were resting on the bed, half-raised, her throat straight, shouting endlessly: 'Peiyin! Peiyin! Peiyin!'
'Here! Here!' she rushed to her mother's bedside, supporting her shoulders and patting her comfortingly, asking in rapid succession: 'What's wrong? Mom? Do you want to get up for a walk? Do you need to use the bathroom? I'll help you!' She bent down and searched for slippers under her mother's bed.
'No, no!' her mother gripped her wrist, her eyes fixed on the window, filled with an indescribable fear and timidity, trembling as she said, 'There's someone outside, watching me from the window.'
Here we go again. A wave of helplessness and frustration washed over Peiyin. Letting go of her mother, she walked straight to the window, pushed it wide open, and let in a cool, rainy breeze. She looked outside. Her mother's window faced the backyard, which was paved with cement and empty except for a clothesline stretching across the small courtyard from two walls. There was nothing else in the yard. Of course, there was nothing else.
'No one, Mom,' she said, turning back to her mother's bedside. 'Look, there's no one outside the window. You're dreaming. You must have woken up from a nightmare!'
'Nonsense!' her mother grew agitated and furious. 'I haven't slept at all. How could I be dreaming? I haven't slept all night. There's someone outside the window, a man with a big beard.'
A man with a big beard? Peiyin took a breath. Among the people they had interacted with, only one had a big beard: Dr. Zhong! The doctor who operated on Peiwa! Here we go again! This endless problem! This inescapable psychological chain! Here we go again. She sighed softly and shook her head. 'That's just a hallucination, Mom.' Her voice was hollow and powerless, just repeating: 'There's no one outside the window. No one with a big beard or a small beard! You're hallucinating.'
'I'm not hallucinating!' her mother got angry, her eyes wide and round. Her thin hands beat the bed rail hard, glaring fiercely at Peiyin as she roared, 'You're on their side! You want to harm me too! I know you want to send me to a lunatic asylum! You deliberately say there's no one! You unkind, ungrateful, and ill-behaved brat! I don't want you! Go! Get out! Call your brother! Call Peiwa! I'll tell Peiwa that only Peiwa is kind and considerate to me. Go call Peiwa! You go! Quickly!'
Peiyin looked at her mother with compassion, her heart twisting in pain. She retreated silently, stepping toward the door, her mind filled with sorrow as she thought: Humans, such a smart creature, have invented various sciences, capable of flying into space and reaching the moon, yet there is no medicine to heal the illness of the soul! She retreated silently, pushed back by her mother's shouting, until she reached the door. She collided with Han Yongxiu, who had come running at the sound. Han Yongxiu was clearly woken up by the noise, still wearing his pajamas, tying the belt of his robe, asking urgently, 'What's going on? What's wrong now?'