Chapter 38 Sickness and Tenderness

January 12, 1980, was a gloomy Saturday morning.

Wutong Courtyard.

Cheng Kaiyan lay on the bed, resting her head on a soft pillow, smelling the fresh scent of the sun and laundry detergent.

He tilted his head to look at the glass window, on which were many transparent raindrops.

The drizzling rain washed away the yellow sand brought by the sandstorms of the past few days, and also cleaned the entire capital city thoroughly.

Gusts of wind made the leaves and branches in the courtyard rustle, which made people fall asleep.

“Ahem… I didn’t expect I caught a cold!”

Cheng Kaiyan buried his pale face under the pillow and muttered in a muffled voice.

Because speaking involves the throat, the throat feels like it is stuffed with broken glass, causing a tearing pain.

Even the old wound on my chest began to ache slightly.

“I shouldn’t have been so eager. These days I’ve been writing manuscripts all the time. I’m exhausted!”

Over the past ten days, Cheng Kaiyan has basically maintained a text output of 8,000 words per day, which has consumed a lot of mental and physical energy.

After finishing the manuscript yesterday, I relaxed quickly.

In addition, I had a mutton hotpot last night and sweated a little. I came back and rode my bike to send the manuscript out, so I was exposed to the wind.

As soon as I woke up in the morning, I found myself sick.

“Dong Dong Dong~”

Outside the door, Xu Yuxiu knocked gently.

She was also a little confused. She usually got up at this time, so why was he still sleeping in bed?
My child has always been lazy since he was young, but since he came back from the army, he has become extremely self-disciplined and gets up at six o’clock every day without fail.

Especially now it’s winter, sometimes she can’t even get up. This guy can actually get up at six o’clock every day. It’s really a miracle.

“Kaiyan, why haven’t you gotten up yet today? Don’t you usually get up early?”

Perhaps it was the sound of coughing that caught Xu Yuxiu’s attention.

Xu Yuxiu didn’t hear any response, so she pushed the door open and walked in. She saw Cheng Kaiyan lying on the bed with a look of something wrong on her face.

“What’s wrong? Do you have a cold?”

Xu Yuxiu sat down on the edge of the bed and asked softly.

“It’s nothing, mom. I just have a slight cold… cough cough!”

Cheng Kaiyan shook his head and spoke in a muffled voice, but his voice was a little hoarse, and was accompanied by bursts of coughing that he had suppressed.

To be honest, he had too much confidence in his growing body and thought he was made of iron.

“Child, a cold is not a small matter. Don’t be afraid. Tell me if you have anything. I’m here.”

Xu Yuxiu’s words were filled with both anger and deep worry and heartache. She stretched out her hands to straighten Cheng Kaiyan’s head which was buried in the quilt, stroked his face with her fingers, and looked into his eyes.

“Ah.”

When Cheng Kaiyan saw her mother’s concerned and worried look, her heart warmed and she nodded obediently.

To be honest, he had never experienced such genuine care and concern like this before.

Even when the epidemic broke out in his previous life, he managed to get through it alone.

“Let mom check if you have a fever, why are you hiding!”

Xu Yuxiu lowered her head while muttering something, and without saying anything, she held Cheng Kaiyan down and pressed her fair and delicate forehead against his.

Suddenly, a scorching heat came.

Sure enough, I had a fever.

“Rest for a while. I’ll go get you some medicine, and then I’ll ask Mr. Yi at the entrance of the alley to come and see you. He’s an old doctor.”

Xu Yuxiu raised her head, sat on the bed, turned sideways and tucked the corner of the quilt for Cheng Kaiyan.

Then he got up and went to the kitchen, got a basin of cold water, a clean towel and some antipyretic medicine.

“Wow…”

Listening to the sound of water dripping into the enamel basin, Cheng Kaiyan then felt a wet towel on his forehead, which immediately made him feel cool and refreshed.

“Take the antipyretic medicine and get some sleep. Mom will go get Uncle Yi to come check on you.”

Xu Yuxiu poured another cup of hot water, helped Cheng Kaiyan drink it, and then went out.

……

In a daze, Cheng Kaiyan was lying on the bed and had a dream. In the dream, she recalled many memories from her childhood and past lives. They were projected in her brain frame by frame like a film.

“hiss……”

Suddenly, my arm felt a pain.

Cheng Kaiyan woke up suddenly and saw several bottles of white and yellow medicine hanging above her head. Her mother was standing behind an old man in a white coat, who was holding a needle as thick as a straw from later times and trying to insert it into her blood vessel.

“Fuck! Old man, you are trying to kill me for money! Such a thick needle!”

Cheng Kaiyan sucked in a breath of cold air and felt like her heart was about to jump out. Anyone who woke up and saw a weird old man giving them an injection with a syringe as thick as a straw would be shocked.

“As expected, people with a fever tend to talk nonsense. Master Yi is an old doctor, how could he commit murder for money? I was originally planning to give you an injection in the buttocks, but then I thought that you are an adult, and it would be embarrassing to tell others about it, so I changed to an IV.”

Xu Yuxiu folded her arms and refuted.

Butt shot! Never mind.

Cheng Kaiyan felt weak just thinking about it. Nowadays, a buttock injection is not as simple as just one shot. Although the effect is quick after one shot, half of the buttock cannot touch the stool for at least three or four days.

After her mother’s reminder, Cheng Kaiyan also knew that this Mr. Yi was the one who was rumored to have an affair with his daughter-in-law in the alley.

Cheng Kaiyan guessed that the reason why Uncle Yi did not die was because he had good medical skills. He studied traditional Chinese medicine in his early years and later studied Western medicine.

In those days, people didn’t go directly to the hospital to get injections like in later generations. There were small clinics or doctors in many alleys.

If someone is sick, everyone basically goes directly to the doctor’s house and gives injections at home.

In the countryside, this situation is even more common. A doctor has to take care of an area of ​​ten miles around, riding a bicycle everywhere and treating patients everywhere. If there is no bicycle, it will be more difficult and he will have to walk.

At this time, Uncle Yi had finished the injection, adjusted the injection speed, and took his other hand to check the pulse. After a while, Uncle Yi asked in surprise: “How old is this child?”

“I’m twenty and I’m twenty-one. What’s wrong?”

The old man stroked his beard and said, “His kidney energy is very sufficient, his forehead is full, and his pulse is like that of a child.”

“child?”

“Well, that means his body is still developing, and most of the nutrients in his body are used for development, so he is prone to illness like a child. Just eat more good food, and it’s not a big deal. He should be fine in two years. But this kid is expected to be in good health in the future, and live longer than the average person.”

Uncle Yi is not surprised. He sees all kinds of patients when he sees them.

He put away the medicine box, then collected a consultation fee of 1.2 yuan and left, which included the cost of the medicine.

“It’s better to be a doctor to make money…”

Cheng Kaiyan looked at the old man’s back and sighed in a hoarse voice.

“It’s just a bit busy. I went to see a young wife in the hospital late at night.”

Xu Yuxiu’s sudden remark almost made Cheng Kaiyan burst out laughing.

…Because she was getting an injection and had to change the medicine every once in a while, my mother didn’t go out.

It was drizzling outside the window. A corner of the window was exposed for ventilation. From time to time, a few drops of rain splashed in, leaving a few marks on the dry ground.

The room was very quiet. Cheng Kaiyan was lying on the bed with her eyes closed, resting, while her mother Xu Yuxiu was sitting beside the bed, knitting a sweater for Cheng Kaiyan.

It looked like a gray and white sweater. Xu Yuxiu didn’t like red very much. On the one hand, she felt that too many people wore it, and on the other hand, she felt that it looked ugly and a bit tacky.

The two chatted and enjoyed this hard-earned time together.

“Didn’t you get enough rest during this period? I noticed that sometimes the lights in your room were on at night. This is not the way to make progress.

You’ve only just come back and you’ve already made someone sick. Mom knows you’re under a lot of pressure.

When you first came back, you were quite relaxed. You enjoyed your meals, lay on a recliner in the sun and fell asleep. You slept for half a day. It was so nice at that time.

You are under a lot of pressure, and on the one hand it is because I have high expectations of you. I feel that you are my son, Xu Yuxiu, so how could you be worse than others?

On the other hand, there were people gossiping outside, but fortunately you were hardworking and wrote a novel, which temporarily suppressed the matter.

But then he went to Beijing Normal University as a teaching assistant. Who among them was not a top student with high academic qualifications and high IQ?
It doesn’t matter if we can’t compete. We just need to do our own job well and don’t care what others say.

Just like what you wrote in the novel, don’t let external factors affect you. The alienation of people by the social environment is indeed terrible. “

Xu Yuxiu advised earnestly that as a mother, although she hoped that Cheng Kaiyan would be successful, she hoped even more that he would be healthy.

“You still looking at that?”

Cheng Kaiyan smiled with her eyes closed, but in her heart she said, ‘Your son is no worse than those top students!’

“I’ve watched it many times! A submarine at night…”

Xu Yuxiu had a proud smile on her face, and her beautiful dark eyes were filled with pride.

In fact, before seeing the submarine at night, Xu Yuxiu had never thought that her young son would have so many ideas. Sometimes he imagined a whirlpool of sea monsters, sometimes he imagined an interstellar explosion, and he even secretly drove a submarine while she was sleeping!
Damn brat!

Obviously mom also wants to explore the seabed with you in a submarine, why are you hiding from her?
It’s fun just thinking about it!
However, Cheng Kaiyan had her eyes closed, so she naturally didn’t see the expression on Xu Yuxiu’s face.

Not long after, he fell asleep leaning against Xu Yuxiu, with a smile on his face all the time…
–
When he woke up again, he heard bursts of piano sounds.

But I saw Xu Yuxiu sitting upright on the piano stool, playing the piano with both hands.

The slender, white jade fingers flew across the black and white piano keys like dancing butterflies, her movements were smooth and flowing, her jade back stood upright and her posture was graceful, with a kind of nobility and elegance that emanated from her bones.

Moonlight by Desi Piou.

A name popped up in Cheng Kaiyan’s mind. It was not very famous, but it was a real famous song.

The corresponding piece is probably Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata”.

However, Desi Biao’s Moonlight is very gentle and soothing, just like Impressionism in painting, with a dreamy and hazy feeling, and is cool and beautiful to the extreme, as if bathing in the sparse moonlight slanting down from the clouds.

It is also often used in prenatal education, and playing it when people are asleep has a certain effect in soothing emotions and relieving stress.

“Aunt Xu plays the piano really well, much better than the teacher in our school.”

“Mmmmmmm!”

Sitting on the small sofa next to the window were the little girl Zhan Xinyu and Zhao Ruixue.

It is understandable that Zhan Xinyu would come here every weekend to do her homework, under the pretext of asking Cheng Kaiyan to tutor her.

Zhao Ruixue used to be a person who seldom went home easily, but now she goes home more often from school.

“Hehe, you two really know how to talk.”

Xu Yuxiu smiled faintly and the song ended.

Perhaps sensing something, she subconsciously turned around and saw Cheng Kaiyan looking at her with her eyes open, so she smiled and asked, “Kaiyan is awake, how about this song? Are you feeling better?”

“Much better, Mom, your level is probably higher than that of ordinary performers. If we set up a piano training class in the future, it will definitely make money.”

Cheng Kaiyan gave a thumbs up and praised.

“Virtue~Money, money, money, you’re obsessed with money.”

Xu Yuxiu raised her lips happily, but she didn’t let him off. She said, “I’ll go get you some food. It’s past three o’clock now, you must be starving.”

“It’s past three?”

Cheng Kaiyan was stunned, and when she looked up, it was already 3:16 in the afternoon.

Mother left the room.

Cheng Kaiyan raised her hand and looked at the Band-Aid on her hand. It had been pierced by a needle as thick as a straw and it still hurt.

But after the injection, I feel much better.

He slowly got dressed and sat down on the desk, then asked casually, “Ruixue, you won the last English poetry recitation competition. Did you participate in this poetry writing competition?”

“Not yet. I’ve been reviewing for the final exams these days. The poetry competition is said to last for a long time, until before the final exams, which gives us plenty of time. Kaiyan, have you participated?”

After Zhao Ruixue finished her explanation, she looked at Cheng Kaiyan with expectation.

She was actually looking forward to seeing what Cheng Kaiyan’s poetry was like. After all, this guy’s debut work “Submarine at Night” was so stunning, so his poetry should not be bad either.

She thought that if Cheng Kaiyan did not attend, she would force him to write it no matter what.

“Our Dean Fang asked all teachers in the Chinese Department to participate, so I wrote a poem.”

Cheng Kaiyan picked up a pen and wrote something on the notebook that looked like musical symbols.

“Then I will taste it carefully when the time comes!” Zhao Ruixue said in surprise.

The poetry competition just started this week and is divided into three stages.

The submission and creation period is two weeks, and the following week is the judging and awards stage, which is the week after next.

“You can savor this poem, or this song, right now.”

Cheng Kaiyan picked up the paper in her hand and sat in front of the piano.

Before Zhao Ruixue could react, a faintly sad tune sounded in her ears, and she could hear Cheng Kaiyan singing in a hoarse voice due to a cold:

“There was a girl in the village named Xiaofang, who was pretty and kind, with a pair of beautiful big eyes and thick and long braids. On the night before returning to the city, you and I came to the river, and the tears that had never been shed flowed along the river…”

After listening to the song, Zhao Ruixue, Zhan Xinyu, and Xu Yuxiu who walked in with a bowl of rice were stunned.

Zhan Xinyu: “What…what song is this? Brother Yan, why have I never heard of it before?”

Xu Yuxiu: “Yeah Kaiyan, I think it sounds pretty good, but a little sad.”

Zhao Ruixue: “It seems to be about the return of educated youth to the city.”

Cheng Kaiyan explained: “The name of this song is Xiao Fang.”

“Can you still write songs?”

Everyone’s eyes lit up.

Two in one.

Thanks to Kaixingua12138 for the -point reward and Qingyundun for the -point reward.

Crab crab!

There are also everyone’s monthly tickets. There are too many people, so I will summarize them when I have time.

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(End of this chapter)