Chapter 27 : Love Her to Death

But in fact, Tang Zhen should have been able to see Chi Yuqin one more time, if she hadn’t been isolated by her roommates.

That was during her second year of graduate school. She was working on a project with her mentor and was busy every day. No one told her that Chi Yuqin was coming to give a lecture.

By the time she heard the news and rushed over from the lab, all that was left for her was an empty auditorium.

Tang Zhen still remembered how dark the sky was that night, how hard the wind blew. The person who loved rain so much felt for the first time that rain was so annoying.

The wind blew, and the poster on the wall was blown off.

Tang Zhen bent down to pick up the poster, looked at the photo of Chi Yuqin on it, and then put it in her schoolbag. She hid the poster under her bedsheet. Occasionally, when she was too tired or couldn’t go on, she would take it out and look at it.

From her initial dislike of medicine, she gradually fell in love with it, all because of Chi Yuqin.

Perhaps it was because she worked too hard, so hard that every professor and mentor who saw her would be deeply impressed by her, which gave her more opportunities than others.

It was just that she didn’t know at the time that these opportunities, earned through her own efforts, would become a seed of jealousy in the eyes of others.

That day, Tang Zhen stayed in the library until it closed before returning to her dorm.

From a distance, she saw a crowd of people gathered at the entrance of the dormitory. She could vaguely see heart-shaped candles and a boy standing in the middle of the heart, holding a bouquet of roses.

This kind of scene was common on university campuses. It wasn’t until she got closer that the crowd suddenly made way, and the boy who had been standing in the middle of the heart, his face obscured by the bouquet, walked up to Tang Zhen.

The people around them, as if they had practiced beforehand, suddenly started cheering—

“Say yes, say yes!”

Many people had pursued Tang Zhen, but this was the first time someone had confessed so openly and grandly.

The boy in front of her was in the same year but in a different major. He was handsome, came from a good family, and was recognized as the Prince Charming of their year.

“Tang Zhen, I like you.”

Even though she had only met Chi Yuqin once, Tang Zhen was already certain about her sexual orientation.

She didn’t like boys. She liked girls. She liked Chi Yuqin.

“I’m sorry, I don’t like you.”

The boy didn’t expect Tang Zhen to refuse so bluntly. He persisted, blocking Tang Zhen’s way and not letting her leave—

“But I really like you. Give me a chance, okay? I can satisfy whatever you like!”

“Look, I’ve put in so much effort just to make you happy. Don’t you like it?”

“If you’re not satisfied with something, just say it. Don’t make it so embarrassing, okay?”

Hearing this, Tang Zhen felt there was no need to waste any more time. This kind of public “courtship” behavior, which didn’t consider the girl’s intentions and was purely to satisfy one’s own vanity, was already a form of sexual harassment.

“I’m really sorry, senior, I already have someone I like.” Only after she said this did the boy stop pestering her.

Tang Zhen didn’t understand why, for some boys, ‘I have someone I like’ was more convincing than ‘I don’t like you.’ Who were they respecting then? They claimed to like her, but they respected the person she liked more? When could a girl’s refusal be treated as a valid expression of her rights?

Tang Zhen didn’t hesitate for a moment. She walked around the boy in front of her, squeezed through the crowd, and went back to her dorm.

The atmosphere in the dorm started to turn sour from then on.

As soon as Tang Zhen returned, before she could even put down her schoolbag, the lights were turned off by her roommates.

“You’re back so late! Do you think we’re your maids?”

“Be quiet! Can’t you see we’re trying to sleep?”

“I don’t know what she’s pretending for! Acting all high and mighty outside, but in reality, she’s a loner!”

In the darkness, Tang Zhen stood by her desk, her shoulders thin and weak. There was no external force, but she felt her arms hanging limply at her sides.

Tang Zhen stared at the faint glow of her phone screen. She didn’t argue, just took her toiletries and went out silently.

The public washroom was empty. She was the only one there. She washed up silently, then returned to the dorm silently, making no sound.

After getting into bed, Tang Zhen lifted a corner of her bedsheet. The poster was revealed, and so was Chi Yuqin’s face.

In a sense, Chi Yuqin was not only her secret crush but also her spiritual comfort.

From then on, the targeting from her roommates became more and more severe. No one spoke to Tang Zhen anymore. When they saw her on the street, they would turn their heads and walk away. When they returned to the dorm, they would slam things around and occasionally throw out a sarcastic remark—”Who does she think she is? How could the top student possibly look at us?”

Tang Zhen endured it all. She was from out of town, so she couldn’t afford to cause trouble, nor did she dare to. She thought that since they couldn’t get along, then so be it. After graduation, who would remember whom?

But she didn’t expect that her tolerance would not only not quell the trouble but would make it worse.

Who said that campus life was always pure? The scheming among peers… wasn’t much cleaner than in society.

One day after winter had set in, Tang Zhen returned to her dorm from the lab and saw that her bed had been ransacked. Her quilt and pillow were thrown on the floor, and the poster of Chi Yuqin was in the hands of her roommates.

Tang Zhen’s mind buzzed. She rushed over to snatch back the poster they had found—

“What are you doing?! Give it back!”

How could one person fight against three…

Not only did she not get the poster back, but she was also pushed back. Her lower back hit the corner of the desk, a sharp pain shooting through her.

The three of them looked at her with malicious intent, their eyes full of malice—

“I didn’t know you had this kind of hobby.”

“Hiding a senior’s poster under your bed?”

“No wonder you’re always asking about Senior Chi, and you even rejected Lin Xu when he confessed to you. So you like girls, you’re a lesbian!”

“You like her but don’t dare to say it, only daring to do these dirty things in secret. You’re a pervert!”

Rumors are like breeding poisonous insects. And just like that, Tang Zhen was labeled a ‘pervert.’

The matter didn’t end there. Her roommates also reported the situation to the counselor, requesting a change of dorm.

It sounded nice to say they were changing dorms, but in reality, they were forcing Tang Zhen to move out.

The counselor called Tang Zhen to her office and had a talk with her—

“They said… you are…”

Before the counselor could finish, Tang Zhen spoke first—

“They went through my things first.”

“It was indeed wrong of them to go through your things, but you hid Chi Yuqin’s poster under your bed… and you’re always asking about her…”

“So, you think it’s my fault?”

“I’m not saying whose fault it is, it’s just that this has a bad influence. And you’re only in your second year of graduate school… you have to think about your future, right?” The counselor frowned and added, “Actually, this matter is easy to solve. It’s just a poster, it doesn’t represent anything. You can just explain clearly that you’re not… not that…”

The counselor couldn’t even bring herself to say the word ‘lesbian.’ Tang Zhen felt that this conversation had lost its necessity. The stance had been unfair from the very beginning.

“I am. I’m a lesbian.”

The counselor probably didn’t expect that a seemingly gentle and weak girl would have such a strong personality. Her previously slightly relaxed expression now fell.

“In that case, you can only move out of the dorm.”

With the matter escalating to this point, Tang Zhen was pushed to the forefront of public opinion. Almost everyone avoided her. The few who were willing to talk to her were not sincere, just looking for more gossip to talk about after meals.

She didn’t know why things had turned out this way. It was clearly them who had gone through her things, but in the end, it was all her fault?

Was it because they were the majority, so they were right?

So right and wrong could be determined by numbers.

She had done nothing, yet she was the one who was put in a cage.

During that time, whether she was in class, in the lab, or in the cafeteria, Tang Zhen could hear whispers and discussions….

She would always receive harassing calls and messages from unknown numbers—

‘Are you a lesbian?’

‘How much for one night?’

‘You’ve never had a man, right? Let me develop you.’

Tang Zhen started to lose a lot of hair and couldn’t sleep at night. She would hide and cry alone, and then pretend to be fine, going to class, the lab, and the library alone as usual.

She didn’t know how long she could last, or how long this nightmare would end…

She only knew that the gloomy sky would probably never brighten.

Just when she was about to break, her mentor, who was leading her project, helped her change dorms on the grounds that research required staying up late and for the smooth progress of the project. She was moved in with the senior who was also working on the project.

In a two-person dorm, Tang Zhen was still very cautious.

On the first day she moved in, she and her senior bought clay pot rice from the south gate for dinner.

Back in the dorm, the two of them were eating.

Tang Zhen had been suppressed for too long and no longer dared to trust anyone easily. She had almost stirred the noodles in her bowl into a paste before she stammered—

“Senior, you… you don’t mind, do you? I… I can move…”

Before she could finish, the senior who had been eating suddenly turned around… and used her chopsticks to take a meatball from Tang Zhen’s bowl and put it directly into her mouth—

“I don’t mind at all. Hurry up and eat. We have to go to the lab after we’re done.”

Tears immediately fell from Tang Zhen’s eyes. That day’s clay pot rice was finished with her tears.

So, when Chen Min asked her if she minded, that’s why she had eaten a mouthful of noodles with such force.

She had had her umbrella torn, been drenched in the rain, and had also had someone hold an umbrella for her.

—

Chen Min was completely shocked. If she hadn’t heard it from Tang Zhen herself, she would never have guessed… that this person had such a past.

“What’s wrong?” Tang Zhen bit her lip and smiled, her hand shaking Chen Min’s arm.

“Why are you so foolish? Just for someone you’ve only met once?”

“I don’t know either…”

Perhaps… I’m just a stubborn person who walks a single path to the end, not turning back even after hitting a wall.

Chen Min genuinely felt sorry for the girl in front of her. She pulled her into a hug, holding her tightly, and stroked Tang Zhen’s head repeatedly. When they separated, both their eyes were wet.

She took a tissue and wiped her eyes, not admitting that she had cried, insisting that it was the spicy snail rice noodles, and blaming it all on Si Xiaolin.

Tang Zhen smiled and poked Chen Min’s arm with her finger. “You two are so sweet~”

Chen Min: “Sweet my ass. You haven’t seen her when she’s annoying. She can piss you off and then bring you back to life.”

Whether it was annoying or sweet, at least that person was really by your side.

“I really worked my ass off to get into Renhua. I was almost studying to death…” Tang Zhen hugged the sofa cushion and sat up. “On the first day of reporting, I stood in front of the hospital display board for a long time, looking at Chi Yuqin’s photo. I prayed to every god I could, just hoping to be assigned to her. The Buddha took pity on me… and finally granted my wish.”

“The Buddha is indeed very pitiful to you, but… aren’t you afraid that Chi Yuqin is already married? It’s been seven years… you two haven’t seen each other again.”

“I am! She’s seven years older than me, thirty-three this year… according to the general rules of life, she should not only be married but probably have had her second child. But she hasn’t! Not only is she not married, she doesn’t even have a partner! Her family is pushing her to go on blind dates. She took a call in front of me, and I overheard it!”

Tang Zhen suddenly became energetic, her bright eyes wide—

“Do you think—this is fate? How did I happen to overhear it?”

Chen Min pursed her lips. “You might as well say she’s single for you.”

“I’m not that infatuated. And…” Tang Zhen looked troubled and stammered, “She’s a little different from what I imagined…”

“What’s different?”

“She’s so fierce, her words are so venomous. When she scolds me, I’m really scared. I don’t dare to look at her, don’t dare to make eye contact with her, and I get so nervous I stutter… every time I’m scolded, I want to hit a wall… but she was clearly not like this before. She used to be very gentle…”

“She was gentle?!” Chen Min’s jaw almost dropped. “Do you have some kind of misunderstanding about her? Her sharp tongue isn’t a new thing.”

Ever since Chen Min had known of Chi Yuqin’s existence, her tongue had been this sharp.

But then again, it was a white moonlight… it was understandable.

Tang Zhen had now taken the cushion she was holding and thrown it aside. She lowered her head, her fingers drawing circles on her knees.

The little girl had been drinking, her face was red and her eyes were red too. Even Chen Min, an outsider, felt a pang of pity for her.

“Then now… what do you plan to do?”

“What do you mean?”

“You like her so much. Don’t you have a next step?”

Tang Zhen took the cushion she had just thrown out and held it to her stomach. Her two eyes were fixed on the plastic coffee table leg, not just in a daze—

“I’ve tested her.”

If Tang Zhen had said this before, Chen Min definitely wouldn’t have believed her. But now… she felt it wasn’t impossible.

“You… how did you test her?”

“She treated me and another colleague to dinner before. In the middle of it, she went to the restroom. When she was coming back… I heard her footsteps. I deliberately said in a volume she could hear that I’ve never been in a relationship! I’m single! I’m sure she absolutely heard it! I immediately found an excuse to go out. I really wanted to know her reaction!”

“Then what was her reaction?”

Tang Zhen still remembered Chi Yuqin’s appearance—

“She was leaning against the window, smoking. The carved lattice window, a gentle breeze, leaning against the railing and looking into the distance… the thin smoke brushed past her face, slowly moving away and then closer again, hiss…”

She involuntarily took a breath and continued—

“It’s her eyes… you know? The way she looked at me… that meaningful look. Although I couldn’t guess what she was thinking, I could feel there was something. My intuition told me there was something!”

Chen Min felt it was unlikely. It wasn’t that she didn’t believe Tang Zhen’s intuition, it was just that Chi Yuqin… it was really hard to guess her thoughts based on intuition alone.

“You’re still saying you’re not infatuated. Just one look… you—”

“Not just that, we had dinner alone again later!”

“You had dinner alone again?”

At this point, Tang Zhen’s face was a little hot, and she was a little embarrassed—

“It was raining that day, and I couldn’t get a cab. She drove over, and there’s a night market street near our hospital, so she took me there…”

Tang Zhen recalled Chi Yuqin’s gaze and the words she had said—

Chi Yuqin asked Tang Zhen, ‘Am I amazing? Am I beautiful?’

She had really liked her for too long… seven years. Almost every imaginable scene had been imagined in Tang Zhen’s mind. So after Chi Yuqin asked that question, for Tang Zhen… saying ‘Chi Yuqin is beautiful’ was a very normal thing to say, as normal as drinking water when thirsty, eating when hungry, and breathing when holding your breath.

“So when she smiled and asked me, I deliberately acted shy, knocked over the soda, and deliberately made myself seem nervous… and at a loss… because I found that she really likes to see me flustered and blushing at times like this. I did that, and she… she looked at me for a little longer…”

Chen Min understood—

“You were pretending to be well-behaved?!”

Since it had come to this, there was nothing Tang Zhen wouldn’t admit. Playing some “little tricks” on the person you like was probably something every girl with a secret crush would do.

Ever since she discovered that Chi Yuqin liked to see her react this way, Tang Zhen had been doing it. It was harmless, had nothing to do with anyone else. It was probably just that she had liked Chi Yuqin for too long, so long that now that she had the chance to stand in front of her, she was willing to cater to her to get a little bit of a response from her.

“And today… I was at a colleague gathering, and I saw her car…”

If it hadn’t been for seeing her car, Tang Zhen thought she probably wouldn’t have drunk that glass of wine, even if it meant offending people.

“I don’t believe in such coincidences. I just bet… bet on whether she saw me, and bet on whether she would come to pick me up.”

Chen Min was a little unsure whether to call this girl foolish or clever. On one hand, she had suffered so much for liking Chi Yuqin for seven years. On the other, she had drunk at night just to bet on whether Chi Yuqin would come.

“What if she hadn’t come? Would you have just waited?”

“I’m not stupid. I definitely wouldn’t joke with my own safety. I set a time for myself, ten minutes… I would only wait for ten minutes! If she didn’t come in ten minutes, I would immediately call a cab back.”

Tang Zhen suddenly sat up straight and held up her phone to Chen Min! her finger poking the screen—

“Nine minutes and fifty-eight seconds! She came!”

“Do you know how fast two seconds pass? I immediately stopped it!”

One moment Tang Zhen was still immersed in joy, the next her face was full of disappointment—

“She stopped the car and let me in. But once we were in the car… she didn’t say a single word to me! For a full forty minutes! Her face was so sour. I don’t know where I offended her. She… she’s a psycho! So unpredictable! I’m so angry, so angry!!”

“She’s so fierce at work! I’m scared… and after work, she’s good one moment and bad the next! Psycho, psycho!!”

She was cursing, but her hand was still pulling on Chen Min—

“Si Xiaolin is close with her. Can you ask Si Xiaolin to ask her? Does she like girls? Find out about her sexual orientation?”

Her childish expression… was like asking for candy at New Year’s, making Chen Min laugh out loud—

“You say Chi Yuqin is sick, but you’re not much better for liking her.”

“I am sick… but can you go and ask? If you ask, I’ll probably be eighty percent better…”

Tang Zhen was really angry. While being angry, she didn’t forget to set her alarm for the next morning. She pulled Chen Min over to look at the alarm she had set, looking pitiful and wronged—

“I can’t be late. If I’m late… she’ll scold me again.”

Tang Zhen was already drunk, her words disjointed. Chen Min wanted to help her back to her bedroom, but she refused, hugging the sofa and refusing to let go.

Chen Min had no choice but to give up the idea of getting her back to her bedroom. Instead, she took a blanket and covered her with it, stroking the baby hairs on this person’s forehead—

“Alright, alright, go to sleep~”

“You ask Si Xiaolin to ask her, ask her…”

And so she slept for a night.

When Tang Zhen woke up, Chen Min had already been out and bought breakfast.

When a person is in a bad mood, a little drink is enough to get them drunk. At this moment, she looked at Chen Min, her head a mess. She remembered that she had said a lot of things yesterday, but she couldn’t remember exactly what she had said.

She hugged the blanket and slowly stood up from the sofa, then slowly shuffled over, glanced at Chen Min, and immediately lowered her head.

“I…”

“You’re awake?” Chen Min asked. “You should probably not drink in the future. You’re quite scary when you’re drunk.”

Tang Zhen’s head was throbbing. She pressed the heels of her palms to her temples and rubbed them hard—

“I… didn’t say anything crazy yesterday, did I?”

“You did.”

“Ah… I… what did I say?”

“You said you love Chi Yuqin, love her to death.”