"What did you talk to that woman about? She must have come for the person we saved today."
Su Cui asked back, "Bai Xue, do you know who the person you saved today is?"
"Is it Wei Yun?" Su Baixue bit her lip. "At first I didn't think so, but when that woman came just now, I felt it was him."
Su Cui stroked Su Baixue's head. Su Baixue was perceptive and very smart.
"The snow has stopped." Su Cui took Su Baixue's hand and led her outside. "Let's go wait for the sunrise."
"Mm." Su Baixue nodded.
As she was leaving, Qin Yang asked, "Where are you going?"
Su Baixue turned back with a smile. "It's almost sunrise. We're going to watch it. Xiao Qin, do you want to come?"
"Oh, you go ahead." Xiao Qin lowered his head and continued playing his game. "I don't watch that."
*
At six o'clock, the sky was just about to brighten but hadn't yet. Darkness clung stubbornly, reluctant to leave, and everything was hazy gray.
Su Cui and Su Baixue stood in the hospital courtyard and waited. After more than ten minutes, the east gradually brightened, and the distant scenery emerged like a lightly brushed landscape painting, its outlines becoming clear.
"The sun is coming out," Su Baixue said.
"It's beautiful," Su Cui remarked, gazing into the distance.
"Mm."
The chill was thick; even with the sun rising, there was no warmth at all. But as the sky grew lighter, the sound of car horns increased, and the breakfast stalls on the street corners lifted their steamer baskets, finally bringing a feeling of warmth.
In the misty snow, Su Baixue looked at Su Cui's deeply sunken profile under the morning light, her wrinkled skin. Time had flowed like water, carving so many marks.
"Can I know your real name?" she asked Su Cui softly.
Su Cui tightened her grip on Su Baixue's hand.
"Su Cui."
What is my name to you?
It will die,
Like the melancholy rustle of the sea
Lapping against the shore,
Like the nocturnal sound of the dense forest.
It will leave a faded imprint
In the yellowed pages of a keepsake album,
Like the pattern carved on a tombstone
In a language no one understands.
*
Behind a row of brick-red walls covered with snow, the withered branches were laced with frost. The plum tree's branches, heavy with snow, trembled as they stretched over the wall, having struggled to spread their limbs in the moonlight.
Inside the wall was a private villa in City A.
Beneath the ornate crystal chandelier, someone held the handrail and slowly ascended the spiral staircase. Slippers stepped on the black marble floor, producing steady, even footsteps.
"Thump... thump, thump." A knock at the door.
No sound came from inside the room.
The visitor was used to it.
He turned the doorknob and looked at the young man sitting silently by the window. Carefully, he asked, "Yangyang, how about Grandpa plays chess with you?"
In front of the huge floor-to-ceiling window, the heavy curtains had been pulled open, letting in the faint morning light. The young man in blue pajamas shook his pale face.
Behind him, a soft sigh escaped.
Then the door was closed.
By the window, a chessboard lay on the coffee table. The young man had been staring at it quietly for a long time. The board was crowded with black stones, leaving only one spot in the middle.
Su Yang got off the bed and stood barefoot on the cold floor. He reached out and placed the white stone he had been holding into the middle of the black stones.
This white stone had been warm in his palm for a long time. Unlike the cold black stones, it was different. But once it left his palm, no matter how hot, it would eventually grow cold.
Su Yang suddenly crouched down and hugged his head.
"Crowded."
He said this.
He was having trouble breathing.