Zhaozhao hugged him and stood on the ring for half an hour.

Shen Yan let everyone go, and stayed with them. In the middle of the night, Shen Yan helped him to clean with a hot towel, and his hair and feet were carefully washed with hot water, and he was all covered with medicine. Before she left, Shen Yan asked her in a low voice outside the screen, "He's been taking painkillers for the past two days, you know?"

It turned out to be a painkiller: "Where is the pain?"

"It's a headache," Shen Yan patted her shoulder, "I'm outside, I'm calling for something."

Zhao Zhao calmed down slightly and went around behind the screen.

It is estimated that Shen Yan wanted him to sleep for a while, or because he was afraid of stimulating his emotions, he didn't even turn on the light, and lit the darkest candle in the frosted glass. He should be more awake, just like when she came last time, holding his head in a still position. didn't think that last time, under the candle tonight, his shadow was pulled up on the wall, giving her the illusion of walking into the torrent of time.

In particular, there are wood-carved screens, incense burners, and burning water, and there is a faint white mist in front of Shen Ce.

"Boil water, do you want to drink tea?" Zhaozhao tried to speak softly, "I'll make it for you?"

Zhaozhao sat down beside him, Shen Ce raised his arms like a habit, and Zhaozhao got into his arms.

"Want me to talk with you, or stay like this?" She wanted to be with him, and she knew that he needed herself.

"I may..." he whispered, "I can't say a few words with you."

The voice was calm, and Zhaozhao felt more at ease: "That's fine, it's too late anyway."

In the semi-darkness, Shen Ce hugged the only living creature he could feel, Zhao Zhao.

He couldn't tell her, you look in front of us, there are people all over the place. His fingers were shaking, and his legs couldn't move. Look at this one here, fourteen years old. The white-haired veteran there, perhaps he sold himself for a few days of money to feed his grandson before he was sent to this Shura battlefield...

Shen Ce finally understood why the old monk who took care of him once said: As a general, don't remember the past.

The generals of the past needed to protect their territory and their clansmen, they needed to protect their comrades, and they needed to keep themselves alive on the battlefield. Either the enemy died or I died. Now all these reasons to kill the enemy are gone.

Can pierce the chest, cut the throat, behead the head... all the touch, touch, and smell are back.

Everything is real, alive, and just happened.

...

Shen Ce looked at his wet palm, there was liquid on it, grayish-yellow, all over it. When you move your hand, it drips down, it's blood.

He also finally understood why he was not red.

No matter if you put on corrective glasses or take them off, you will never see the kind of stunning that others describe. The doctor even said that his color blindness was a mental disorder, completely unsolvable.

This is God's mercy. For a normal person who has been baptized by modern civilization for more than 20 years, if he could see the original appearance of tonight, I am afraid he would have gone crazy.

The sudden feeling of cutting his throat hit him again, and the blood poured on his face.

Zhaozhao felt his hand on his body trembling.

"Does your hand hurt?" She wanted to pull his hand over to see if there was any wound.

Shen Ce suddenly took his hand away, not wanting her to touch it. He was silent, rubbing those fingers as if there was something sticky on them. Zhaozhao still wanted to look at his hand, but he avoided it again: "I'm a little thirsty."

Zhao Zhao dismantled a small bag of tea, poured it into a small dark brown purple clay pot, rinsed the tea once, and poured it into a wooden barrel containing waste water. Add more water, pour him a glass, and hand it over.

He didn't move.

Zhaozhao blew on the mouth of the cup and pressed it to his lips. Seeing that he drank it all in one gulp, she became anxious: "It's still hot."

Shen Ce took the teacup away.

"Go back to sleep." He couldn't control his voice, and his eyes began to shake again.

But she quickly lowered her eyelashes to prevent her from seeing her gradual disorder.

"Why are you suddenly... unhappy?" She couldn't think of a suitable word to describe it.

"There's no reason," Shen Ce moved his lips and held the teacup, trying to make himself able to say a few more words, so as not to be misunderstood and angry like the last time he couldn't restrain the pain, "When I was a child... I was kidnapped and stimulated. , sometimes it is."

Zhaozhao thought of what Shen Jiaheng said, and was silent for a long time: "Is this also related to taking painkillers?"

"It's a small problem," he swallowed slightly, his mouth was dry, and he couldn't open his eyes due to the bloody aura. "Nerve headache, occasionally."

Shen Ce has done his best, but he can't open his eyes: "If you don't believe me, let Shen Yan ask me for last year's medical report. It doesn't matter."

He held the hands of his face to cover his eyelids with his fingers, and urged again in a low voice, "Go to sleep."

Shen Ce instinctively longed for her to stay, but he couldn't, he was already abnormal. What to say after that, calling Shen Yan in and taking her upstairs is already instinctive. The disappearance of Zhaozhao took away the only yang energy left here.

Zhaozhao couldn't sleep that night, so he thought about the kidnapping incident mentioned by his cousin several times. Six-year-old is already the age of memory, and being tortured to the point of death, it is true that any person will have serious psychological trauma.

Before dawn, the landline in her room rang once, just when she was about to fall asleep, Zhao Zhao was woken up a few seconds later. "Hello?" She leaned against the bed.

The response to her was a uniform beep, and before she answered, the other party hung up.

She expected that the injury on Shen Ce's face would make it impossible to be the best man, and she would definitely find an excuse to dodge it. But what didn't expect was that the tea room that night was the last time she and Shen Ce were in Macau.

He asked Shen Yan to give her a message. He had business to do, and he would contact her in the future.

"There is something wrong with your brother's laboratory, so he left temporarily." Mom also explained the same.

Uncle Shen said with a smile, it was a coincidence, but Shen Ce valued this project very much. It was the first investment he made with money from his family. Investing in a desalination laboratory is a matter of benefiting the country and the people. Naturally, Uncle Shen Not much to blame.

"He is making domestic reverse osmosis membranes, and this technology has been monopolized by foreign countries in the past," Uncle Shen explained to her, "almost in the late 1990s, we only had domestic capabilities. When you worshiped your ancestors, it was not long before mass production in China. ."

"Investment is good, young and old," Mom said. "I didn't get into this until I was eighteen."

"He is precocious," Uncle Shen said with a smile, "different from ordinary children."

It was followed by a grand wedding.

My grandfather doted on my mother very much, and also made a special trip to Macau. The two Shen families met again, this time more solemnly than last time. Because it was the two elders who really met, and that year, only Shen Ce represented the ancestors.

On the day of the wedding banquet, Shen Jiaheng also asked Shen Yan, why Shen Ce left without saying a word: "Isn't it hiding some love debt?" The men were joking, and they answered quickly, Shen Yan said with a smile: " Who knows."

Shen Yan replaced him as the best man. The two were about the same size, and the size of the clothes would be changed a little.

Zhaozhao was with Shen Yan the whole time that day, and he was always in awe. Thinking that Shen Ce was supposed to be here, he couldn't help but wonder why he left without saying goodbye and didn't contact him after that.

A week after the wedding, everyone left one after another.

Zhaozhao had no reason to stay any longer and booked a flight back. Shen Yan learned that she was leaving, and rushed back from the mainland to take her to the airport in person.

Before leaving the customs, Zhaozhao couldn't help but ask, "Doesn't he have a cell phone?"

"Didn't I give it to you?" Shen Yan asked back, even Shen Jiaheng had it.

She shook her head. The two have been together since they met, and they don't need a mobile phone at all, so they don't even think about asking for a number.

Shen Yan was embarrassed: "But his previous account is invalid, and I don't know when to change it..." When he said this, he also felt that it was such a coincidence, as if he was lying.

"Forget it," Zhaozhao smiled, "help me tell him, pay attention to your body."

"It's not like you can't see each other, come to play more in winter and summer vacations."

Zhaozhao smiled reluctantly, and took out a doll from his bag: "I bought it myself in Macau these two days, and bought it for your son. I'll entertain him when I have time to bring him to Montreal."

"Okay." Shen Yan took it with a smile.

In fact, Shen Yan couldn't figure out the relationship between Shen Ce and this younger sister. It was close, but it wasn't that close, but she was the only one who could really hold Shen Ce in the ring. But Shen Ce was too inhumane to her. When they were together, they seemed to be able to talk to each other, and they left without leaving any contact information.

As a man, Shen Yan didn't even kindly guess that his handsome uncle was too open emotionally, what did he do to others in private? But after thinking about it, I still think that it won't. Shen Ce is very measured to the family.

After entering university, she was so busy with her studies that she did not go to Hong Kong and Macau. Uncle Shen also called her for this, so that she could spend more winter and summer vacations. Zhaozhao always made excuses to evade her. When her mother came over, she often wanted to talk to her about the Shen family in Macau, but she also avoided it.

Later, even my sister secretly asked her: "Mom asked me, do you have any opinion on that side? Are you unwilling to go back?"

"No," she replied, "Mom thinks too much about getting married, for fear of neglecting me."

On Halloween in the fourth year of college, Zhaozhao prepared candy at home for the children who came to ask for it. The person who takes care of her daily life will leave after setting the fireplace for her.

At the table, the phone rang, she guessed it was her mother, and turned on the speakerphone.

"Packing candy?"

"Um."

"Mom, will you go back this year?"

"No, I still want to go out to play."

Mom was laughing and said to the people around her, "Have a word with Zhaozhao."

Zhaozhao thought it was Uncle Shen. It was like this every time. Mom said it first, then Uncle Shen.

There was extra noise over the phone, there was laughter, and many people were talking, probably in Macau, there were many people.

Zhaozhao peeled off a candy and tasted it by himself, still thinking what Uncle Shen did not to say: "Is the signal bad?" She asked strangely.

"No."

Her heart shrank heavily.

More than three years later, from graduating from high school to about to finish college, she thought she had grown up and thought she didn't care anymore. Zhaozhao unintentionally peeled off a piece of fondant and bit it between his teeth. The teeth were completely useless and were shaking like a human being.

"Packing candy?" was his second sentence.

Zhaozhao wondered if those two weeks were hallucinations, how could he be so calm. She was glad that there were no outsiders here, and turned to look at the fire in the fireplace, her eyes sore from the light of the fire.

She wants to hang up.

"Zhao Zhao." He called her.

She lowered her head and found that she couldn't hang up the phone.

The noise and noise on the phone disappeared. don't know where he went, Zhaozhao could hear the subtle, slightly depressed breath ups and downs from the receiver.

"Talk to me," he said.

Zhao Zhao was quiet for a long time, but hung up the phone.