Chapter 5: Borrowing an Umbrella

Lu Canran followed Liang Yuanzheng’s suggestion and completed the hospital admission procedures for observation.

She didn’t tell her parents.

The hallucinations were still present. When Qin Bingshuang and Xu Qiao came to visit her at the hospital, one had [How could something like this happen] floating above her head, and the other had [If I’d known, we would’ve gone to a different place to eat—my poor little Canran].

Zhu Huaxin also called, full of righteous fury. “Keep the test results, Canran. When you’re better, we’re going to file a complaint against that shop owner and report him! Send me two photos first. I’ll post them on the campus confession wall and then on Xiaohongshu^[1]Xiaohongshu (literally “Little Red Book”) is a popular Chinese social media and e-commerce platform where users share lifestyle content, product reviews, beauty tips, travel experiences, … Continue reading. We’ll make sure everyone avoids that place.”

Xu Qiao said, “You and a PE teacher—two people got food poisoning in one day. I heard from someone that place often uses ingredients that aren’t fresh. When the owner was getting beaten up, some people ran to the kitchen to watch. Some of the dishes smelled stale even from a distance.”

Qin Bingshuang: [Then next time I’ll wear a mask and sneak in to eat. It’s not sanitary or healthy, but it’s still so good.]

“Don’t eat there again,” Lu Canran said to Qin Bingshuang. “And don’t sneak in either. There are plenty of delicious places. I can recommend more to you. Wearing a mask is just deceiving yourself.”

Qin Bingshuang was surprised and a little guilty. “How did you know I was thinking of going there with a mask?”

After confirming once again that she truly had “mind-reading” abilities, Lu Canran said seriously, “I can see your thoughts.”

Qin Bingshuang burst out laughing, unconcerned. “Then why don’t you go see what Liang Yuanzheng is thinking?”

Lu Canran answered honestly, “I want to, but I can’t.”

She urged Xu Qiao to return to the library and continue studying. The CET-4 and CET-6 exams were just over a month away, and this batch of third-year students was also preparing for the postgraduate entrance exam. Even though the number of admissions had been expanding every year, the number of university students also kept increasing. Each year saw a larger wave of fresh graduates registering for the exam, along with previous graduates making a second or third attempt.

The library was quiet, air-conditioned, and had volunteers maintaining order. Food and drink were prohibited inside, making it a battleground for those preparing for civil service exams, public institution recruitment, or cramming for final exams. Xu Qiao had been lining up early every day for a month to secure a seat in the library, and Lu Canran didn’t want to disrupt her studies because of this incident.

Qin Bingshuang had come during her lunch break and still had to return to work in the afternoon. Before leaving, she comforted Lu Canran, saying, “Look on the bright side. There’s nothing seriously wrong with your health, and now you have more chances to spend time with ‘that guy’—hey, wait, am I being too much of a hopeless romantic right now?”

Lu Canran said, “No, actually, I was thinking the same thing.”

Qin Bingshuang replied, “Then you’re doomed. You’re totally a hopeless romantic.”

They were still laughing when the door to the hospital room was pushed open, and in walked “that guy”—Liang Yuanzheng.

Lu Canran immediately stopped laughing.

Qin Bingshuang glanced between the two of them, then smiled and greeted, “Senior,” exchanging a few pleasantries.

Liang Yuanzheng remained composed as he discussed Lu Canran’s condition with her. Meanwhile, Lu Canran, who pretended not to care but was in fact listening intently and stealing glances whenever she could, accidentally knocked a book off the edge of the bed.

The sound startled Qin Bingshuang.

Lu Canran and Liang Yuanzheng reached out to pick it up at almost the same time, nearly touching hands. Just a second before his hand would have brushed against the back of hers, Liang Yuanzheng quickly pulled his hand back, pressed his lips together, and clenched his fist.

Lu Canran placed the book back properly and apologized, “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Liang Yuanzheng said, making a joke that wasn’t quite funny enough to be called funny. “Even if these hospital books get completely ruined, it doesn’t matter. You don’t need to compensate for them.”

Maybe it was supposed to be a lighthearted remark, but his expression was so serious that it actually made it seem like the hospital would really hold her accountable.

Lu Canran kept sneaking glances at the top of Liang Yuanzheng’s head.

There was no red little heart floating above it anymore.

It wasn’t until after Qin Bingshuang left that Liang Yuanzheng came over to check on Lu Canran’s reaction, using a forehead thermometer to take her temperature.

The thermometer pressed against the top of Lu Canran’s head, but she was distracted, still thinking about that string of symbols on his head that looked like gibberish—like something had blocked or censored it. It reminded her of how some lyrics on QQ Music, especially ones in certain ethnic minority languages, would display as nothing but a series of 口口.

But Liang Yuanzheng was Han Chinese.

“Will someone be staying with you tonight?” Liang Yuanzheng suddenly asked. “Not informing your parents?”

Lu Canran replied, “Huh? No, my parents are pretty busy lately. It’s not a big deal, so I didn’t want them to worry.”

Her mother, Ms. Lu Qifeng, was currently preparing to open her sixth chain supermarket, which was an upgraded membership-based store. Her father, Li Xinxin, was a writer, and with a deadline approaching, he was fully focused on finishing his manuscript.

Liang Yuanzheng let out a quiet “Mm” and noted down her vitals. “Your roommate seems busy too.”

Lu Canran said, “Yeah.”

“What about Chen Wanli?”

“Huh?”

“Chen Wanli,” Liang Yuanzheng recapped his pen. The brand-new pen slipped naturally into the chest pocket of his coat as he asked casually, “Isn’t he a good friend of yours?”

“Ah, yes,” Lu Canran nodded. “You know him too, Senior?”

“We played basketball together in high school,” Liang Yuanzheng said. “He used to mention you a lot. I thought you two were really close friends, weren’t you?”

Lu Canran explained, “We are good friends, but I didn’t tell him about this.”

—Chen Wanli’s father was a professor at B University, reportedly researching “mind-reading” machines that used big data and AI models to predict behavior. Professor Chen was a strict man, and Lu Canran had been afraid of him since she was a child.

Now, she was even more afraid—terrified that she might be dragged into a lab for human experimentation.

That’s exactly what villains do in movies.

“Also afraid he’d worry?” Liang Yuanzheng looked down. “If no one’s staying with you tonight, I’ll come by a few more times. There’s a call button by the bed—you can press it to get the nurse on duty. If anything comes up, call me. I’ll be around—unless there’s an emergency surgery. For now, none are scheduled.”

He said a lot. After that lightly spoken rhetorical question, he didn’t give her time to think or respond. Instead, he followed it with such a long explanation that Lu Canran’s eyes began to gradually fill with tears.

She felt both touched and delighted, thinking sentimentally, Ah, if only this ‘I’ll be around’ were said outside of this context. But reason reminded her that if it were outside this context, Liang Yuanzheng would never say such a thing.

Lu Canran was the kind of good girl who knew to repay kindness. In the face of such thoughtful care, she immediately responded with appropriately measured concern. “But the nurse said, Senior, you’ve already been working for a long stretch. Are you still working overtime?”

With a sharp snap, Liang Yuanzheng closed the book, the sound startling Lu Canran.

He didn’t look into Lu Canran’s eyes. “I like being in the hospital.”

Lu Canran said admiringly, “Ah… Senior, you’re so dedicated.”

The dedicated senior walked away with a cool demeanor, and only then did Lu Canran remember something—she had been transferred to the internal medicine ward, but wasn’t Liang Yuanzheng on rotation in the emergency department?

While she was still puzzled, Liang Yuanzheng had already left the room.

Just as the door closed, Lu Canran heard someone outside asking, “Yuanzheng, is your hand feeling uncomfortable? Is it wrist soreness or your knuckles? Don’t keep clenching and stretching like that. Come on, let me take a look…”

Lu Canran felt worried, and guilty.

She hadn’t even noticed that Liang Yuanzheng’s hand was bothering him. During their conversation earlier, she had been trying so hard not to sneak glances at him—so nervous that she only managed to peek twelve times. Between the shame of sneaking looks and the intensity of her feelings, she completely missed that he was uncomfortable.

If having a crush were a test, she probably wouldn’t even pass.

Just thinking about how Liang Yuanzheng might come by a few more times made Lu Canran suddenly feel that this bout of food poisoning wasn’t such a bad thing after all. She was even starting to look forward to their next meeting—

This was bad.

Turns out she really was a hopeless romantic.

But after that, all the way until dinnertime, Liang Yuanzheng didn’t show up again.

Lu Canran spent the afternoon napping alone.

There weren’t many inpatients in the internal medicine ward. In this two-person hospital room, the bed next to Lu Canran remained unoccupied.

That was a good thing. Her mind was still uncontrollably active, and even more terrifying—on her way to the bathroom, every single person she passed had dense bullet screens floating above their heads.

The hospital was the place where the soul was most fragile. A man pushing a paralyzed elderly person smiled kindly, speaking with all the words of filial devotion, but above his head floated: [That old thing should just hurry up and die already. Serving him for half a month has worn me out.]

A middle-aged man roughly comforting his wife, claiming there was nothing wrong and that hospitals were all a scam, had gray bullet screens above his head. It was raining non-stop: [This illness is too expensive. I really can’t afford it. Our family only has that much money, and now it’s all going into my treatment. What about her? She’s suffered with me her whole life. I can’t die and still not leave her anything. Why did it have to be me who got sick?]

A mother holding the hand of a bald child spoke gently, saying they would play a little game. But in reality, the bullet screen above her head was filled with sound, and it was crying—harsh, grating sobs, like sharp blades scraping over Lu Canran’s eardrums again and again.

She went to the restroom. The stalls ahead were all occupied, and just as she was about to pull open the door to the last one, a cleaning lady hurriedly stopped her, saying the door was broken.

Lu Canran replied with an “Okay,” turned around, and quietly waited in front of another stall.

Because she saw the cleaning lady’s bullet screen complaining: [Just finished mopping. About to get off work. Don’t dirty it again. So tired. My back hurts. My knees hurt too. Sigh, getting old.]

Some people might think this was a really cool superpower, but for Lu Canran right now, constantly seeing and hearing these things was a kind of torment.

It wasn’t until dinnertime that she finally experienced the benefit of this ability.

At 4:55 p.m., a light drizzle began to fall outside. Qin Bingshuang and Xu Qiao arrived with umbrellas to accompany her for dinner in the hospital cafeteria. The TV was playing a crime drama, talking about a series of dismemberment murders and the ongoing investigation to uncover the mastermind. The bullet screens throughout the cafeteria piled up like storm clouds. Lu Canran tried her best to focus on the drama in an effort to escape them. On the screen, as soon as a certain man appeared, a red arrow shot straight at him—[The real culprit. Time, location, and method of the crime are as follows.]

Immediately after, the screen began describing in detail his motives and methods for each crime.

Lu Canran couldn’t watch any longer. Xu Qiao reached into her bag to grab some tissues and accidentally pulled out a test prep book, which fell right at Lu Canran’s feet. Lu Canran bent down to pick it up, and as she looked at the page, she saw the correct answers floating clearly above each question.

[BBBAC, CDBBA]

In disbelief, she flipped through a few more pages and discovered that even the translation questions had bullet screens displaying the correct answers.

Every single one of them was correct.

Lu Canran realized she had just acquired an extraordinary ability.

If only this ability had awakened before the college entrance exam, or before the CET-4 and CET-6 exams.

“Canran? What’s wrong?”

Lu Canran snapped out of it and immediately handed the book back to Xu Qiao.

In that moment, she even considered taking the civil service exam or the postgraduate entrance exam.

Qin Bingshuang suddenly grabbed Lu Canran’s arm and gestured for her to look to the right. “Look, who is that!”

—It was that someone.

Liang Yuanzheng was there too. He had taken off his white coat and was now wearing a gray shirt and khaki casual pants. Lu Canran noticed that he had changed clothes, and even changed his shoes. His hair had been washed, and even the direction it was combed had subtly shifted.

Qin Bingshuang and Xu Qiao quickly picked up their trays and took the umbrella, walking off in the distance to give Lu Canran a chance.

“Qin Bingshuang said she saw him holding an umbrella. He and my brother each had a big black umbrella. The two of you sharing one would be more than enough,” top-tier romance coach Zhu Huaxin said in a voice message to the group chat, gently guiding her. “Got it? In a bit, go ask him to borrow his umbrella. The two of you share one umbrella, walking together in the rain, having to get close just to stay dry… What a perfect chance to connect. You have to seize it, Canran!”

Lu Canran was nervous. “What if I can’t seize it?”

—The romance coaches agreed she made a good point and immediately took her umbrella, saying they’d leave shortly. They called it “burning the boats,” “removing the firewood from under the cauldron,” “a fight with no retreat,” and “snatching the biggest umbrella on a stormy day.”

Lacking the courage to go up and strike up a conversation, Lu Canran secretly watched Liang Yuanzheng, watching him get his food and look for a seat. He didn’t seem to notice her at all, just carried his tray, eyes straight ahead, and walked right past her row, continuing all the way behind her.

Lu Canran kept wiping the sweat from her palms with a tissue, her hands nervously clenching into fists, then slowly relaxing again. All five fingers were trembling slightly.

As expected, Liang Yuanzheng didn’t notice her. Or maybe he had noticed but, because she was just an ordinary junior schoolmate, he couldn’t be bothered to say hello? She tried to find a more considerate reason to explain his behavior—maybe he was simply tired today. After working overtime for so long, even with a break in the afternoon, he probably didn’t have much energy left. When people are completely exhausted, even greeting others or making small talk can feel burdensome, even with family…

Lu Canran tried to gather as much evidence as she could to deny the idea that “Liang Yuanzheng didn’t see her.” If he truly hadn’t seen her, it meant her earlier glances were safe. But it also meant that his heart didn’t see her.

She couldn’t help sneaking a look back. Lu Canran found that Liang Yuanzheng was sitting three rows behind her, head down, eating his meal. There was no one between them, which meant she couldn’t keep looking back too often—turning her head would be too obvious, too easy to get caught, too blatant.

The top of his head was still blank.

She gloomily finished her meal, dawdling as she carried her tray, tidying up her chopsticks. She even considered making a bit of noise so Liang Yuanzheng might notice her—like accidentally knocking over her bowl or utensils to create a little commotion.

But her upbringing and basic sense of decency wouldn’t allow her to do something like that.

Just as she lifted her tray and headed toward the dish return area, at the very last second, Lu Canran looked back and saw that Liang Yuanzheng was still eating. He had a big appetite and had taken a large portion, with still half left. Judging by his eating speed, it would take him at least ten more minutes to finish.

While part of her thought, That’s good, having a healthy appetite means a healthy body, another part felt quietly disheartened. It had been so long already—if he had just looked up, he would have seen her. But he still hadn’t noticed.

—It’s fine. Once she returned her tray, she would take the initiative to go up to him and ask to borrow his umbrella.

It’s fine, Lu Canran told herself.

Opportunities had to be fought for.

With that thought in mind, Lu Canran adjusted her mindset, lifted her head, straightened her back, and marched confidently toward the dish return area. Just as she placed her tray down, she heard Liang Yuanzheng’s voice behind her.

“Lu Canran, what a coincidence.”

He stood in front of her, expression calm, holding an empty tray that had clearly been cleaned of every bite.

Lu Canran was stunned.

She didn’t even know what exactly she was stunned about—was it the fact that he ate so fast, finishing that much food in just one minute? Or was it that they happened to run into each other at this exact moment?

So they really were fated.

It wasn’t just her imagination.

The stainless steel trays clanged as they stacked together. The dish return area was not far from the main entrance, and outside, heavy rain was pouring down, the roaring wind blowing the cool air onto Lu Canran’s flushed cheeks.

She thought, This really is fate. Fate that she would borrow an umbrella from Liang Yuanzheng, fate that they would share one together through the storm.

Just like Bai Suzhen and Xu Xian… even if they were separated for decades under the Leifeng Pagoda, they would still find their happy ending.

Lu Canran’s heart was pounding, and she tried her best to act natural. “What a coincidence, Senior.”

Liang Yuanzheng glanced at the door and said calmly, “It’s really coming down hard now.”

Yes, Lu Canran thought excitedly, it’s raining hard, and without an umbrella there’s no way back to the outpatient building or the inpatient ward—so now I’m going to borrow your umbrella.

She began preparing her lie—Senior, I just lent my umbrella to a friend. Can I go back with you?

Her lips felt dry. “Yeah, it’s really coming down.”

Liang Yuanzheng said, “Without an umbrella, there’s no way to get back.”

Lu Canran replied, “Right, no way to get back.”

Liang Yuanzheng said casually, “I lent my umbrella to a friend. Can I go back with you?”

Lu Canran: “……”

…Wait a second.

Senior, it seems like we really can’t go back now.

We really can’t go back.