Offense - Chapter 8
Chapter 8
Seeing those two messages, most of Lian Wan's morning drowsiness vanished.
Her first reaction was, surprisingly, guilt and hesitation. The courage she'd had when making her decision had vanished into thin air. She even wanted to close her eyes and go back to sleep.
But the person on the other end was still online and immediately sent a sticker of a little dog baring its teeth in anger.
-!!
The bright daylight shone with a frank brilliance, a stark contrast to all the cloying intimacy and shame of the previous night.
This was Zhou Yanqian's brand of forthrightness.
Lian Wan stared at the sticker, an inexplicable gloom settling in her heart, and let out a long sigh.
She hugged her blanket and tossed and turned in bed, tormenting herself. Finally, she scrambled up, lit up her screen, and wanted to say something, but after thinking it over and over, she tossed the phone aside.
The paranoia and cowardice she displayed in this matter surprised even herself. It was a completely different face from the her in the dream. In front of Zhou Yanqian, Lian Wan found she was losing sight of who she was. For someone who only had herself, this was not a good sign.
The phone was in her pocket, close to her body. Lian Wan could feel its heavy weight. Countless times, she felt the urge to take it out, but in the end, she always stopped herself.
She walked quickly downstairs, taking the corner to bypass the entrance of the Convenience Store. This should have been the most practiced and easy thing for her to do these days.
But today, Lian Wan still turned her head. She clung to a rather ridiculous thought: Just one secret peek, no one will notice.
The rolling shutter was up. The store was open, and someone was inside.
Involuntarily, she searched for that figure, thinking with a focus she herself didn't realize she possessed: Is Zhou Yanqian still waiting for my reply? Lian Wan soon realized that this thought didn't actually contradict the resolution she had made over the past half-month. A faint sense of happiness even seemed to bloom in her heart at this vague possibility.
The possibility that Zhou Yanqian was thinking of her, that she cared.
The glass door was slowly pushed open from the inside.
A resident from upstairs came out-a man in his late thirties who just freeloaded at home, waiting for death. It was a rare sight to see him downstairs. He was carrying a bag and holding an ice cream bar, turning back to say something.
Caught off guard by the door opening, he saw Lian Wan standing not far away, staring intently. Both of them froze for a moment.
Before he could speak, he saw Lian Wan turn and walk away as if startled, her high ponytail swinging, her retreating figure looking quite resolute.
Inside the well-air-conditioned Convenience Store, a woman was huddled behind the counter watching a drama. But she clearly wasn't focused. Her eyes were downcast, her expression cool. When she felt the summer heat waft in through the half-open glass door, she even glanced up.
But the door was already closed.
Zhou Yanqian lowered her head again.
On this morning, so idle it felt like you could reach out and catch a cloud, Zhou Yanqian was in a very bad mood. The phone on the table was dark. She reached out and lit up the screen for the umpteenth time, trying to act nonchalant as she tapped it to check.
There was still no reply to the little dog baring its teeth.
Quite the temper. The corner of Zhou Yanqian's mouth twitched into a smile before falling again. She thought expressionlessly, Whatever. It's not like I have to work right now. I'm bored out of my mind. I have all the time in the world to play with a little puppy.
The self-reassurance had no effect. Her red-painted fingernails, contrary to her usual composure, tapped impatiently on the table.
It seemed nothing was going right. Today was especially hard for Lian Wan.
It was the end of the month. The factory was rushing to settle its shipments. She ran around all day, and by the time she got home, her back was aching. After a shower, she collapsed onto the bed and couldn't get up for a long time.
She stared blankly at the night sky outside her balcony. The physical exhaustion had accumulated to a point where it seemed to distract her from her thoughts.
Lian Wan tried hard to ignore the fact that she had left Zhou Yanqian's messages unanswered all day.
In this matter, she didn't understand herself, nor did she understand Zhou Yanqian. She couldn't figure out how things had gotten to this point when they barely had any connection.
It was the height of summer at the end of July. Even though lush trees shaded the balcony and the ceiling fan was on its highest setting, sweat still beaded continuously on her face and back.
Lian Wan rolled over, letting the sweat on her forehead drip away. She lay perfectly still, reviewing their brief acquaintance, and realized that in front of Zhou Yanqian, she always displayed a kind of dispirited powerlessness. It was as if those days of being at the mercy of fate had returned, and she was once again that girl who couldn't go to college.
Those days had not been pleasant. Lian Wan didn't want to think about them anymore. Life always had to move forward. So, she looked forward and decided to once again try to ignore the fact that she had left Zhou Yanqian hanging for a whole day.
Zhou Yanqian's message vanished like a stone tossed into the sea.
As the weather grew hotter, Lian Wan started waking up earlier and earlier. When she left the house, Pingchuan Town was usually still shrouded in a thin mist. The Vehicle Team hadn't started work yet, and everything was quiet, save for the occasional sound of an early-rising elder turning on a faucet.
Lian Wan walked aimlessly down the alley. The scenery she had seen for over twenty years looked especially hazy in the deserted morning. Along the road she used to take to school, a dense thicket of ivy covered the base of a collapsed wall, with a few small, light purple flowers peeking out from the top.
A stray cat, also an early riser, darted out from the wall and looked at her curiously.
Its expression was so cunning and curious, but as soon as she got closer, it immediately turned and ran away.
Lian Wan stopped and smiled silently.
In the small Pingchuan Town, there wasn't even a single person out for a morning run. Lian Wan walked and looked around, unsure of where she was going.
The morning mist had not yet dispersed. Lian Wan followed the direction the cat had fled and turned a corner.
She didn't often come this way, but she knew the general direction and wasn't afraid of getting lost, so she walked on as she pleased.
On the moss-covered wall were mottled scratches, traces of children's play.
But Lian Wan didn't have a childhood like that.
After her parents passed away, only she and her grandmother were left. Her grandmother couldn't bear to be apart from her only granddaughter and just had her stay at home. While her grandmother did handicrafts to earn money, Lian Wan would help by her side, counting buttons. Sewing one piece of clothing earned them thirty cents. When the sun set and it was time for dinner, the sounds of parents calling their children home to eat would fill the air downstairs. Her grandmother would then stand up and go to the kitchen to cook for the two of them.
When her grandmother cooked, Lian Wan couldn't leave her side either, following her around like a little tail.
Lian Wan had no friends, only her grandmother. The two of them were even together when they went out, walking hand in hand through the alleys. Occasionally, a mischievous child would rush by on a bicycle, and her grandmother would shield her behind her back.
As an adult, Lian Wan rarely reminisced about anything anymore; she only had herself. But those days had become an inseparable part of her life, visible whether her eyes were open or closed. It was like how adults always feel nostalgic for the smoke from kitchen chimneys at dusk.
Lian Wan pressed her lips together and touched the scratches, a sudden emptiness filling her heart.
The sun gradually rose higher, and she walked deeper into the alleys.
Faintly, she saw a figure up ahead and heard some scattered words.
The nearby houses were all still quiet. Lian Wan paid it no mind, assuming it was just a woman from one of the houses who had woken up early. She lifted her feet and walked quietly over. On the other side of the wall grew a lush honey locust tree, its canopy spread out like a large umbrella, though its leaves were sparse. The cool morning breeze rustled through, making one feel slightly tipsy.
"Awoo..." There was a low, panting sound, filled with an intense urgency, as if it were about to drool.
Lian Wan frowned slightly and took a few more steps forward.
At the mouth of the narrow alley, a turn revealed another world.
Gourd vines climbed the wall, a vast expanse of lush green. A woman in a white, knee-length silk dress was squatting, the soft fabric outlining her fine curves. She was holding up a peeled chicken sausage, teasing a small, gray-and-white-furred dog. A faint, almost mocking smile hung on her lips, but the words she spoke were low and gentle: "Slow down... No baring your teeth. Stand properly and eat. No one's going to fight you for it."
Lian Wan recognized her and subconsciously wanted to hide. But Zhou Yanqian heard the footsteps and had already raised her head a moment before she could.
The tense conversation she had anticipated never came. Zhou Yanqian just gave her a detached glance before lowering her head again to feed the little dog, which was wagging its head and tail.
The dog was filthy, and might have even had some stray cat scratches on it, but she didn't seem to mind. She held it affectionately, letting it rub against her calf.
At the narrow turn of the alley, Lian Wan couldn't describe the feeling in her heart. There was no way to avoid her, so she lifted her foot to walk past. The moment their shoulders brushed, she felt something tug at her leg.
She looked down to see that the dog had darted out at some point and was now biting her pant leg, begging for food with playful abandon, its tail wagging so hard it looked like a blooming flower.
Its small belly was warm as it pressed insistently against her.
Lian Wan's face was cold, but in her heart, she didn't dislike the dog. She didn't have any food with her, though, so she could only reach down and pull it off.
The shameless little dog couldn't read the hint in her cold expression and enthusiastically pressed against her again.
"..." The person and the dog were at a stalemate for a moment when a cool voice called from behind her: "Lian Wan."
Lian Wan answered instinctively, "Yes."
The moment the word left her mouth, she wanted to grab the dog and flee in panic.
But while she thought this, her face remained as still as an old well. She only shifted her foot slightly and turned to look back.
The woman's voice was cool, but her expression was relaxed. She even curled her lips into a slight smile and said slowly, "Come here."
Lian Wan didn't move. She just stood there, her expression softening slightly. She was even a little surprised. How could the woman act as if nothing had happened?
"I wasn't following you." Seeing that she didn't move, Zhou Yanqian walked over, reached out to pet the little dog that was wagging its tail at them, and said softly.
Lian Wan didn't speak.
"The other day, when I walked around town, I didn't wait for you. You were angry, weren't you?"
"I figured you were busy and didn't want to disturb you. I'm sorry, that was my fault."
"Before, I thought we were friends... but you've been ignoring me and not replying to my messages. I haven't been sleeping well these past few days, which is why I was just wandering around here."
"But it looks like I'm not the only one with insomnia, right?"
Zhou Yanqian said many things, but the person beside her didn't make a sound. She looked at her silent profile, her tightly pressed lips, and felt a mix of helplessness and tenderness.
She sighed softly and decided to let this confused Little Puppy off the hook for now. "Alright, that's all I have to say. If you still don't want to talk to me, then let's just leave it at that."
"No..."
As if sensing the human emotions, the little dirty dog at her feet whimpered and circled around Lian Wan's pant leg.
Zhou Yanqian leaned a little closer and only then did she hear Lian Wan say in a low voice, "I'm sorry-"
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