The Second Pill

One look

“What sound?” Auntie Li looked puzzled.

Gui Tingyue’s chest rose and fell slightly: “The sound of drumming, just a moment ago.”

“Oh, oh—” Auntie Li suddenly understood: “Not sure which household it was, but if it gets too noisy, I’ll complain to the property management.”

“No, it didn’t disturb my rest,” Gui Tingyue shook her head, confirming repeatedly: “You really heard it, right?”

Auntie Li, clutching the green onions, frowned: “Yes.”

Gui Tingyue’s eyes flickered with more turbulence: “Don’t report it. I like that sound.”

Auntie Li was surprised but still agreed: “Alright,” she turned to look at the floor-to-ceiling southern window in the living room. “It’s just the first time I’ve heard it, so I have no idea which home it came from.”

Gui Tingyue returned to her bedroom and paused by the window. After a moment, she raised her hand.

With a swishing sound, the curtains were drawn aside, as if a magic box had been reopened – the cascading sunlight instantly filled the room. Gui Tingyue stood bathed in it, squinting her eyes.

The tall building opposite came into view.

The architectural style of this mid-rise neighborhood was relatively mediocre. The buildings were plaster yellow, with a slightly European design. It wasn’t aesthetically pleasing, but there were no obvious flaws either.

Rows of identical, symmetrical windows gave it the appearance of an obsessively arranged photo wall, framing the myriad scenes of life.

Recalling the drumming, Gui Tingyue guessed it must have come from the opposite building.

But after scanning from top to bottom, she found nothing.

For lighting considerations, the buildings were spaced relatively far apart. Plus, her eyes weren’t used to such bright sunlight after so long, so at the moment, they felt a bit dry.

Gui Tingyue rubbed her eyelids twice, drew the curtains closed, and returned to the shadows.

She decided to wait – perhaps that person would drum again.

For the rest of the day, Gui Tingyue gave up her afternoon nap, focusing on waiting on her bed. She alternated between checking her phone and looking at the window, a strong anticipation stirred in her heart like a wild wind, giving the desolate wasteland its first clamor in a long while.

Sure enough, the drumming resumed around four in the afternoon.

This time, the drumming was different from noon – no longer wild and unruly. It started fast and slow, the metallic crispness and the muffled drum sounds were mixed together, repeating the same rhythm smoothly. Gradually, the speed of the drumming increased, but it rose and fell freely, so flamboyantly, even with a disdainful arrogance that seemed capable of piercing and shattering the air within a hundred-meter radius into countless tiny, razor-sharp shards of solid ice boring into the eardrums.

Gui Tingyue’s breathing quickened.

She found her feet unconsciously rising on tiptoe, tapping out the beat.

Previously, she had considered them as useless appendages.

She hurriedly got out of bed and opened the curtains again. Her gaze, like a probe seeking other life forms on the surface of the moon, swept quickly across every window of the opposite building.

The drumming lasted a long time, but the limited view prevented Gui Tingyue from pinpointing the source.

She turned and walked out of the bedroom to the more spacious window in the living room.

After opening the window, the drumming was clearer, like a large-scale magic, making her heart race and filling her with longing.

Gui Tingyue leaned out, carefully discerning, trying to find the exact location of the drummer.

Below, two young boys wearing red scarves passed by, also looking up in surprise, trying hard to find the source of the drumming.

Seeing this, Auntie Li walked over and stood beside her: “I was just about to call you out to listen.”

Gui Tingyue still looked out the window: “Can you tell where it’s coming from?”

Auntie Li listened for a moment. “I think it’s right across from us. This never happened before. Is it a new neighbor?”

Gui Tingyue steadied herself: “Maybe.”

Unfortunately, she couldn’t determine who was drumming.

Fortunately, for the next few days, Gui Tingyue could hear the drumming every afternoon between four and four-thirty. She also figured out the drummer’s practice routine, who seemed to be deliberately avoiding time periods that might disturb other residents.

Her diary now had new content, no longer just the despair under cloudy skies, but descriptions of the drumming were added—its rhythm, form, color, even her musings and fantasies.

Musings about the vitality and stirrings it brought her, fantasies about the appearance of the creator of such marvelous rhythm.

“Interest,” “anticipation,” and “heartbeat” – these long-forgotten words began to take shape in her mind again.

Every afternoon, she would sit by the living room window for half an hour, tapping her heels and fingertips, listening to the entire drumming session from across the way.

The girl’s face was devout and focused, like a pilgrim deep in prayer.

Auntie Li noticed the change in her mental state. One afternoon, after coming back from grocery shopping, she chatted with the cleaning staff she knew in the community to find out which new resident was the drumming enthusiast and what building and floor they lived on.

When she came back, she excitedly shared this new information with Gui Tingyue.

It turned out that he really lived in the opposite building, on the same floor, in unit 1203. Yet she had never noticed.

The next day, the familiar drumbeats ignited the evening again. Gui Tingyue hurried to the window, her gaze anxiously fixed on the unit parallel to hers.

It was understandable that she didn’t find it.

After all, based on the housing layout, the areas facing her were the kitchen and bedroom – places he was unlikely to be drumming.

From that day onward, Gui Tingyue’s time by the living room window was getting longer and longer, extending from leaving at 4:30 pm to 5 pm, 5:30 pm, 6 pm, occasionally she would even have dinner while watching the lit window across.

Gui Tingyue felt she was becoming obsessed, like an increasingly unhinged stalker fan.

Fortunately, she was already a mental patient, so Auntie Li’s reaction was one of relief rather than bewilderment.

After a few days, through observing the daily routine of the occupant, Gui Tingyue concluded that he was a man, tall and thin, liked wearing dark clothes, rarely went to the kitchen, and seldom opened his bedroom curtains – like a lone black whale drifting on a remote island, rarely breaking the surface.

The distance made it hard for her to see his face clearly.

But it was enough.

Before taking any more excessive actions, Gui Tingyue warned herself.

As it turned out, curiosity was a difficult contagion to resist – the more you suppress it, the more it rages.

A week later, Gui Tingyue succumbed to her curiosity and bought a small portable white telescope online.

The seller strongly promoted it as suitable for concerts and theater performances, so using it to admire her “idol’s” beauty and performance shouldn’t be too inappropriate or unbecoming.

Besides, she only intended to take one look, just one look – then she could find relief, find peace, find satisfaction, and consider her mission accomplished.

The next day, after receiving the package from Auntie Li, Gui Tingyue returned to her room, unpacked it, made some simple adjustments, and then carried this “8x telescope” to her regular devotee’s seat, right on time.

4:30 pm.

The drumming started as expected, and today’s rhythm was different again, alternating high and low tones, unpredictable and fast, almost too fast to seem human-made – like a summer hailstorm, fierce and sudden, then an autumn drizzle, slowly yet steadily boring through stone, occasionally exploding with thunder, giving the illusion of a one-man band.

Gui Tingyue was already anxious, and with the drumming, her heart clenched to the extreme, her eyes trembling as she stared at the opposite side.

But strangely, the man did not complete the full half-hour practice, as if his energy had been utterly drained, leaving silence once more.

Silence fell around.

Gui Tingyue stood up from her chair, frowning in worry.

At that moment, a figure appeared behind the targeted window – it was the drummer himself. He was still wearing a black T-shirt, and he strode straight toward the kitchen sink, then paused.

His position happened to be directly facing her.

An opportunity not to be missed.

Gui Tingyue took two steps back, glancing over her shoulder to see Auntie Li was humming a tune while preparing dinner. Only then did she carefully take out the telescope from her pocket, adjust it, and raise it to her eyes.

After adjusting the focus, the man’s upper body instantly loomed large and clear, like a close-up scene from a film reel.

In that instant, Gui Tingyue’s heartbeat matched the drumbeat from earlier.

The man leaned slightly, washing his hands, the muscles of his arms bulging with the effort. With his head bent down, his inky black bangs happened to veil his brows and eyes, flickering in and out of view with each movement.

His overall vibe was close to what she had imagined, yet not entirely the same. She thought he’d be wilder, but he was clean and slim, with a hint of unembellished nonchalance.

Realizing her position was too conspicuous, Gui Tingyue looked for cover.

Finally, she shifted slightly behind the curtain and resumed using the telescope.

The next moment, Gui Tingyue’s pupils contracted.

She lowered her hands, momentarily stunned. The scene of the man suddenly lifting his gaze and raising his face replayed like a brand in her mind.

Clearly, any woman would find it impossible to “take just one look” at such a face.