Jiang Yuanye's expression seemed to stiffen for a moment, then slowly relaxed. He pretended to speak casually:
"She's already dead."
Zhou Chaosheng was stunned for a moment.
"Sorry..."
Jiang Yuanye didn’t seem to mind at all and even smiled faintly. But upon closer inspection, there wasn’t a trace of humor in his eyes.
"It’s fine. Maybe, for her, it was a kind of... relief."
"Relief?"
Jiang Yuanye turned the steering wheel, guiding the car onto the elevated highway. His voice, accompanied by the soothing light music, carried a hint of desolation:
"Yes. When she was pregnant with me, Jiang Hai cheated on her, repeatedly using work trips as an excuse to indulge in drunken revelry in other women’s arms. She didn’t know about his infidelity until a mistress, pregnant, came knocking for money to terminate the pregnancy. At that time, she was already nine months pregnant and could only swallow the bitterness in silence."
Jiang Yuanye paused briefly before continuing, "After giving birth to me, her depression worsened. Jiang Hai ignored her entirely. Her condition started deteriorating from that point, and she gradually lost her sanity. Even though she was beautiful, Jiang Hai found her unbearable. Ten years into their marriage, things should have fallen apart, but Jiang Hai never filed for divorce. Instead... he set his sights on her."
Zhou Chaosheng, hearing the indifferent, numb tone, felt that the other wasn’t recounting his own story but rather narrating someone else’s life from the perspective of a detached observer.
"Set his sights on your mother? What do you mean?"
"The literal meaning. By that time, Jiang Hai was already addicted to gambling. Not just that, he started using drugs as well..." Jiang Yuanye's voice revealed a trace of coldness.
Zhou Chaosheng remained silent, refraining from asking further questions.
Jiang Yuanye continued, "Because of gambling, he was heavily in debt. He not only owed loan sharks but also lost his stable job. From then on, he became irritable and violent. Every time he came home drunk, he’d beat us up..."
He paused, his expression no longer as composed as it was at the beginning. "It’s my fault she ended up like this. If it weren’t for me, maybe she wouldn’t have been depressed. Maybe she wouldn’t have turned into..."
A lunatic.
Jiang Yuanye didn’t utter those three words, but Zhou Chaosheng instinctively understood what he left unsaid.
"And then?" Zhou Chaosheng asked softly.
"Then... Jiang Hai sold her, right in our home. He let those people come over to humiliate her in exchange for offsetting his massive debts," Jiang Yuanye said, his voice slightly unsteady.
He took a few hurried breaths but quickly regained his composure.
"Do you want to hear more?"
"If you feel like talking, go ahead."
"…After that, there wasn’t much left to say. She completely lost her mind. Her sanity grew increasingly fragile. Sometimes, she’d mistake me for Jiang Hai and vent all her anger at him onto me. I thought it was fine, at least it meant she harbored resentment toward him. What I feared was that she might still have hope for him."
"But in the end, my hopes were for nothing. As Jiang Hai’s violence became more frequent, the injuries on her body increased as well. And since I had to attend school from Monday to Friday, I couldn’t protect her most of the time. She gradually started to lose her grip on reality, always thinking that the Jiang Hai in front of her was the same man who had crushed her heart ten years ago. Every time Jiang Hai got cornered by loan sharks and couldn’t leave, she’d threaten to jump off a building to force me to save him. One day, I let my guard down, and she actually jumped..."
Hearing this, Zhou Chaosheng couldn’t help but feel that it was nothing short of a miracle for Jiang Yuanye to maintain his arrogant and free-spirited personality even in high school.
No wonder he always wore long sleeves and pants in the summer, often with an oversized school jacket layered on top.
So that’s why.
To cover the scars on his body.
The air seemed stifling, so Jiang Yuanye rolled down the window. Letting the evening breeze in, he exhaled a long, heavy breath.
"In the end, she didn’t die, but she became a vegetable."
In the story Jiang Yuanye recounted, the only thing he didn’t seem to know was the real reason his mother jumped.
Even as an outsider listening, just hearing fragments of the tale was enough to feel the weight and suffocation of that past.
Zhou Chaosheng couldn’t imagine if he had grown up in such a family whether he could have risen and fought his way to where he was now like Jiang Yuanye had.
Perhaps he couldn’t have.
But Jiang Yuanye did.
Because his very essence was like wild grass—unyielding and full of life.
Zhou Chaosheng couldn’t avoid thinking someone like Jiang Yuanye, so resilient and proud, must find it incredibly difficult to reveal his vulnerable side to others.
Let alone in adulthood, where the unspoken rule is to keep family matters private.
So the question remained.
Why did Jiang Yuanye choose to tell him all this?
Zhou Chaosheng lifted his gaze to look at the person in the driver’s seat.
The half-lowered window let in the cool breeze, carrying the dampness unique to the riverside. It stirred the strands of hair on Jiang Yuanye’s forehead.
His smooth, fair forehead was fully exposed, and his sharp yet stunning features were shrouded in a faint mist under the highway’s streetlights.
His left arm rested on the car door, his languid posture betraying no hint that he had just spoken about something so heavy.
To most people, hearing such a story would prompt a response along the lines of: “It’s not your fault. You can’t choose where you’re born.” Or perhaps something encouraging like: “While you can’t choose your birth, you can choose your future.”
But Zhou Chaosheng found himself unable to say any of those words.
First, he wasn’t the person involved. What he understood was only the tip of the iceberg, floating above the surface. He hadn’t personally experienced the pain and harm the other person endured. Not only was it impossible to empathize, but attempting to comfort the other person and suggest letting go of the past would be a form of arrogance on his part.
Second, they were mortal enemies. Showing concern for the other was something that shouldn’t happen between them. Even if the other person actively exposed their wounds to him, he shouldn’t be rushing to offer a bandage.
He knew this.
Jiang Yuanye never needed anyone’s pity or concern.
From the moment, eight years ago, when he handed Jiang Yuanye a bottle of medicine only to be met with rejection, he should have realized that Jiang Yuanye’s pride outweighed everything else.
As Zhou Chaosheng pondered how to respond, Jiang Yuanye took the initiative to break the silence.
"Are you thinking about how to comfort me?" Jiang Yuanye smiled faintly, his gaze fixed on the road ahead. His voice, carried by the night wind, sounded slightly distorted.
"If so, don’t bother." Jiang Yuanye’s tone was casual, almost indifferent. "There’s no deeper meaning behind me telling you all this. I just suddenly remembered how, eight years ago, you saved me once as well. At that time, you even bought me medicine. But I was so ashamed that you saw me in such a disgraceful state that I refused you harshly. Still, you were persistent, forcing the medicine on me and even grabbing my hand, trying to treat my wounds for me. Tell me, back then, were you secretly in love with me?"
Zhou Chaosheng: "…"
He should never have let his compassion take over, thinking Jiang Yuanye might be a pitiful soul.
Someone like this? Feeling sorry for even a second was a mistake.
A cheerful melody played in the wind, while the distant sound of a cruise ship’s horn echoed—dull and prolonged.
"Did you end up using the medicine?" Zhou Chaosheng asked.
"I did," Jiang Yuanye replied.
"Because I held your hand?" Zhou Chaosheng sneered. "So, I held your hand, and you used it. You’re the one who secretly liked me, aren’t you?"
Jiang Yuanye choked on his words. After a coughing fit, he finally defended himself: "No, it’s because I got a call from a neighbor. She said my mom had slit her wrists at home. I thought about how we didn’t have any medicine at home, and taking her to the hospital would cost more money. Your medicine just happened to be a lifesaver…"
So that’s how it was.
Zhou Chaosheng thought back to the phone call he vaguely overheard back then.
It was that phone call that changed Jiang Yuanye’s decision.
Zhou Chaosheng hadn’t expected that the call was about Jiang Yuanye’s mother attempting suicide.
For a brief moment, Zhou Chaosheng felt a sense of suffocation, as if a tide had risen over his head, leaving him unable to breathe.
He hesitated for a long time before finally speaking:
“Did it… hurt back then?”
When Zhou Chaosheng asked, he realized the question wasn’t as difficult to voice as he had imagined.
He noticed Jiang Yuanye’s hand tighten slightly on the steering wheel, the tension forming a visible line between his finger and wrist bones. His slender fingers, with clearly defined joints and veins illuminated by the light, stood out sharply.
It was clear that Zhou Chaosheng’s question had unsettled him.
Zhou Chaosheng waited patiently.
When the music transitioned to Li Runqi’s “Mang,” Jiang Yuanye finally spoke, his voice low and deliberate:
“…It’s in the past.
Whether it hurt or not doesn’t matter anymore.”
As soon as those words fell, Zhou Chaosheng understood the underlying meaning.
Jiang Yuanye didn’t want to talk about it anymore. Zhou Chaosheng, knowing better, refrained from asking further.
The window gradually rolled up, and the cross breeze seemed to carry the earlier melancholy out onto the open road.
When it finally closed completely, the lingering sorrow felt almost like a figment of Zhou Chaosheng’s imagination.
“Baby.”
Hearing that term, Zhou Chaosheng’s expression flickered slightly.
Since their days of clashing in the alleyway until now, it had been a long time since he’d heard those words.
Hearing them suddenly from Jiang Yuanye’s lips left him momentarily dazed.
“…What?”
He turned to look at him, replying irritably.
Jiang Yuanye let out a short laugh, his fingers tapping lightly on the steering wheel. Whatever he was thinking about remained unclear. When he spoke again, his tone carried an inexplicable trace of warmth.
“Back then…”
“Thank you.”
Zhou Chaosheng was caught off guard, his expression momentarily blank.
“…For what?”
Jiang Yuanye merely chuckled softly, offering no further explanation.
In that light laugh, Zhou Chaosheng slowly came to understand.
Perhaps it was due to the scenery evoking memories, or perhaps it was history repeating itself.
The "thank you" he had waited for eight years finally came on this day.
He thought to himself, somewhat aimlessly if not for his memory loss, perhaps he would never have waited for Jiang Yuanye to lower his guard in this lifetime.
Zhou Chaosheng lowered his eyelashes, their long shadows casting a faint obscurity over his eyes, concealing the unclear emotions brewing within them.
“You once said you hated me… Why?”
Jiang Yuanye raised an eyebrow, casting him a brief glance before quickly looking away. The moment was fleeting, so fast it was impossible to grasp clearly.
“I also said I liked you. Why are you only asking about that?” Jiang Yuanye replied.
“Because I care,” Zhou Chaosheng said simply.
“If a lot of people hated you, would you be curious about all their reasons?” Jiang Yuanye asked, puzzled.
“No,” Zhou Chaosheng answered, staring directly at him.
“I’m only curious about your reason.”