Fei Du looked up in surprise. "What's wrong?"
In that instant, Luo Wenzhou's body had acted faster than thought.
Since Tao Ran had started talking about Xia Xiaonan's family, he'd been thinking of Fei Du, thinking of that summer weekend seven years ago, when he opened the door on the room full of withered flowers with the endless song playing upstairs. The quiet and empty great residence had been full of floating dust. When he'd arrived, there'd been a "grand ceremony" awaiting him.
He'd gone back there countless times in his dreams. Did Fei Du recall her over and over?
What was he thinking when his recollections ended?
Luo Wenzhou had no idea what he'd been planning to say when he'd impulsively grabbed Fei Du's hand.
What could he say?
This was a painful memory, after all, a scrape on the heart. He couldn't make it better with a few words.
"Don't be nervous." Fei Du patted his hand. "Unless something unexpected happens, my guess is that even if she's standing on the rooftop, she won't jump in the end."
"I thought you weren't wearing enough just now. There's a padded coat in the trunk." Luo Wenzhou racked his brains for something to say. "Go put it on."
Fei Du had been driving his car for a few days and had never noticed that that lump in the trunk was an article of clothing—he'd thought it was scraps to use for cleaning the car. Hearing these words, President Fei felt that both his spirit and his eyes had been abused, like an unconventional form of domestic violence.
He shook Luo Wenzhou off without another word and hurriedly walked off in his immaculate attire.
Luo Wenzhou said, "Wait a minute, I wasn't finished yet. How do you know she won't jump in the end?"
His colleague's voice came through his earpiece. "Captain Luo, the girl really is on the roof of the administration building!"
High up, the wind was even more bitingly cold. It pierced to the bone, making a rustling sound as it rubbed past.
Xia Xiaonan's hospital gown was thin. Her skin had already lost sensation. She looked down from on high at the nearby darkened classroom building.
She remembered she'd been doing a physics exam then, racking her brains to distinguish the difficult-to-parse concepts, chewing off a corner of her pen cap. Suddenly, the class became agitated. Her desk mate jabbed her with an elbow, shouting into her ear, "Come look, someone's about to jump!"
The tip of her pen made a sharp cut in the paper. Xia Xiaonan's heart swayed. She turned her head and saw a person jumping off the administration building across from them, like a heap of ashes that had come out of nowhere.
Half the class stood up, falling over each other to get to the window and look, crowding aside Xia Xiaonan, who had been next to the window to start with. Everyone looked; only she didn't dare.
Until the police had belatedly come to clean up the scene, Xia Xiaonan hadn't known who had jumped, and she hadn't had time to take a last look at her.
In all the fifteen years since her birth, this delicate-featured young girl had lived the words "didn't dare" written large. She didn't dare to step forward bravely, didn't dare to open her mouth to demand a share in her family's burdens; she always wanted to pretend she was an ordinary girl like the others, who could block up her ears and study, ignoring what was happening outside the window.
She didn't dare to speak up for others, and she didn't dare to speak for herself. She didn't dare to resist all the unreasonable bullying and humiliation. Her past life had only taught her to be silent and exercise restraint, waiting for the inconstant wind of fate to blow the bad things away. But fate never sent charcoal in snowy weather; it could only pile frost on top of snow.
She also hadn't dared to run off with that simple-minded boy, hadn't dared to throw away her phone, hadn't dared to come out of the garbage bin—
When everything was over, she hadn't even dared to go look at Feng Bin.
As long as she didn't face up to that, she could pretend that it had all been a nightmare; none of it had happened.
Xia Xiaonan held the ice-cold guard rail with both hands, her palms "tasting" the raw-sweet rust, a long string of tears falling from the top of the eighth floor.
Luo Wenzhou clipped on his walkie-talkie. "Don't turn on the sirens, tell the firetrucks and ambulance to keep quiet, too. Take care not to startle her! Anyone with quick reflexes who's good at talking, get ready to go up with me, move fast! Is the air rescue cushion ready?"
Police, firemen, and medical personnel crowded around on all sides, turning the courtyard of the school, which had been peaceful after school had let out, into a pot of porridge. The manager of the administration building was scared to tears.
Fei Du silently avoided the crowd, walking towards the classroom building across from the administration building. After he'd gotten the keys from the manager and asked for information, he walked directly into the junior middle Year 2, Class 6 classroom.
The classroom was deserted. A negligent student on duty hadn't cleaned the blackboard entirely, leaving a corner of writing that seemed to be an algebra problem. Fei Du looked out the window and turned on the classroom's lights.
Then he opened the window, facing the girl who was already standing outside the guardrail.
Xia Xiaonan had been staring at that classroom all along. She hadn't expected that the lights would suddenly turn on inside it; for a moment she panicked.
At the same time, the highly efficient firemen had quickly filled up the airbag and were trying to guess where she would fall. Luo Wenzhou, taking along a group of firemen and criminal police officers, went out on the rooftop. The long, neat hem of Fei Du's coat was blown behind him by the wind from the window, his sleeves flying up.
He narrowed his eyes, meeting the gaze of the girl on the rooftop, who was at her wits' end.
"Young lady." Luo Wenzhou, arriving on the rooftop, addressed Xia Xiaonan from afar. "It's too windy. You should be careful."
Xia Xiaonan's body suddenly shook. She grabbed the railing with both hands and swiftly turned her head. She didn't speak, instead letting out a scream.
Luo Wenzhou put his hands in front of his chest, spreading them open for her to see, very gently making a gesture of pressing down.
"If a person comes to the point where she wants to jump off a building but can't say a word about it to anyone else, don't you think that's a pity?—Little girl, you can actually speak, can't you?"
Xia Xiaonan didn't speak. Her cold little face was white. She looked at him expressionlessly, then turned her head back to the lit-up classroom.
Fei Du smiled at her, pointing to the seats lined up against the window. When he'd counted to the fifth one, he pulled out the chair and sat down, opening the window next to him.
A junior middle school student's seat was rather small and narrow for a long-limbed adult man. He curled his legs up awkwardly under the table, propping his elbows on top of it.
Xia Xiaonan's gaze had followed him involuntarily. Now she gave a start—that was the seat she'd sat in before.
Luo Wenzhou quickly made some gestures. While Xia Xiaonan's attention was focused elsewhere, a few policemen and firemen separated and moved in towards her. This way, her movements would be contained within a very small area. Even if she really did jump, probability that the air rescue cushion would catch her would be greatly increased.
Luo Wenzhou lowered his voice and said into his walkie-talkie, "She's on the west side of the roof, about a meter and a half from the corner. Rescue workers on the seventh floor move into position—"
"Copy."
The voice had just come over the walkie-talkie when firemen climbed out of the windows on the seventh floor's western corridor and waited tensely for orders, in case she fell.
The firemen on the ground were holding up the air rescue cushion, constantly making slight adjustments to its position.
"My mom jumped from here." Xia Xiaonan was silent a moment, looking towards the lit-up classroom, then finally spoke. When she wasn't screaming, her voice was soft and sweet, a touch nasal, seeming very gentle. "Stay away from me."
The criminal policemen stealthily drawing near simultaneously looked at Luo Wenzhou. Luo Wenzhou gestured for them to stop.—While they couldn't get close, at least their position meant she couldn't go that way.
"We know. It truly was a tragedy. Are you planning to follow in her footsteps now?" Luo Wenzhou said. "Little girl, what trouble are you in?"
But Xia Xiaonan didn't answer him at all. She only whispered, "If I jump, it'll all be over."
"You're wrong." Luo Wenzhou sighed. "I really ought to let my medical examiner comrades come over to give you the pop sci explanation. Jumping isn't a sure thing at all. Do you know what happens after?
"If you fall from here, you'll become an uncontrollable falling body. You won't necessarily fall headfirst, and you may not die immediately. For a minute, or even a few minutes, you'll be able to clearly feel the pain of all your bones being broken, your organs being pierced. You'll be a bloody mess on the ground, in ten thousand times more pain than now."
Xia Xiaonan trembled and gave a sob.
"If you don't die immediately, according to regulations, of course we'll have to do everything we can to save you. The probability of survival would be very small, so 'according to regulations,' we'd basically be adding to your suffering. It'll leave you no dignity, a rather ugly sight. Then the medical examiners will hastily stitch you up into a human-like appearance, and notify your grandfather to come identity the body." Luo Wenzhou said, "But that's all right, he has experience, anyway. He's identified too many bodies in his life."
Xia Xiaonan kept staring at the lit-up classroom, choked with sobs.
The firemen at the seventh-floor window climbed up a few meters like geckos, approaching Xia Xiaonan, while the policemen on the roof narrowed their ring of encirclement a step. Luo Wenzhou exchanged looks with his colleagues, then carefully walked another step forward. "If you're in some difficulty and you don't say it now, you won't have an opportunity to say it later. You aren't even afraid of death, so what's the point of keeping a secret?"
Xia Xiaonan at last turned her head to look at him. "She hated me. That's why she jumped from here."
Everyone had thought she would say something related to Feng Bin. They hadn't expected the girl to suddenly say this. For a time they all stared.
Just then, Luo Wenzhou's phone vibrated. He saw that Fei Du had sent him a voice message.
Fei Du unhurriedly said, "Standing where she is, Xia Xiaonan will have discovered by now that before her mom jumped, she was watching her, waiting for her to look up, then jumping on purpose so she would see."
Luo Wenzhou looked in horror at the classroom building across from him.
Fei Du said, "Otherwise, there are hundreds of thousands of tall buildings in the world. Why did she choose this one? Why did she have to jump in this direction?"
Luo Wenzhou said to Xia Xiaonan, "Who hated you? Your mom?"
"She hated me." Xia Xiaonan pointed to the classroom building. "She was looking at me like this, I don't know for how long, until someone in the class noticed her, until I looked up and saw her… She wanted to jump so I'd see it, to show me that she was finally free of us.
"My dad and my grandfather were sick. All the family's money was spent on them. In the end, they couldn't do any more chemotherapy, they could only buy traditional medicine from some quacks, go with a 'conservative treatment.' At night there was only a curtain door separating me from them. Often I heard my dad in so much pain that he couldn't sleep, tossing around, moaning and groaning, waking my mom. She'd have to get up and take care of him. Then she'd cry non-stop—aside from her job at the school, she had another job. She worked day and night to earn money, and when she got home, she couldn't even sleep well. Sometimes my dad said, 'If you really can't take it, then let's get a divorce. We won't be a burden on you.'
"But I was afraid. If she was gone, what would I do?"
Xia Xiaonan lowered her gaze, looking at the only illumination nearby. She felt she was standing upon the clouds, in an unreal place, so she involuntarily pulled out the words she had buried for many years. "I knew she had insomnia, weak nerves, depression, but when my dad said that they should get divorced, I would run out crying, begging her not to abandon us. Whenever she couldn't stand it anymore and poured something out to me, I wouldn't listen. I was afraid that if I listened, I'd have to take responsibility.
"I'd only fob her off. Every time I'd tell her, 'Mom, I don't understand any of this, I'll study hard and in the future…in the future I'll get into a good university, find a good job, and you'll be able to rest and live in comfort.'"
As Xia Xiaonan said the last few words, she was sobbing almost too hard to speak. The rooftop's railing creaked as she shook.
Luo Wenzhou immediately responded, "So you want to imitate her now, cast off the encumbrance of your grandfather? You think he doesn't have the good grace to die, that he's a burden on you, so you're taking revenge on him?"
Xia Xiaonan shook her head hard.
Luo Wenzhou purposefully made his voice cold. "But from how it looks to us, that's just what you mean to do. Otherwise, what other meaning is there in you falling down and turning into a bloody pulp?"
"Is there any meaning in death?" Xia Xiaonan said loudly. "If she can escape, then why can't I escape?"
"Because Feng Bin is waiting for you over there," Luo Wenzhou said. "He died with a grievance. Have you thought about how you're going to explain yourself to him? Xia Xiaonan, you can escape the living, but do you really think you can also escape the dead?"
"Feng Bin" seemed to be a taboo name; Xia Xiaonan once again lost control and began to scream. But while she was standing outside of the guardrail, her hands were tightly holding the railing. Luo Wenzhou took notice of her body language and realized that Fei Du had been right. At the critical moment, this girl didn't have the courage to make the leap.
He decisively waved his hand. At this time, the fireman nearest to Xia Xiaonan had already gotten within five meters of her during their conversation. The fireman immediately charged out and grabbed Xia Xiaonan's arm before she could react.
Xia Xiaonan screamed, nearly losing her balance. The other two firemen who had been hanging outside the seventh floor encircled her, one on each side. Like a helpless worm, the girl was brought down from the rooftop by the crowd, the sound of her crying breaking into the whistling night wind.
Luo Wenzhou walked over and looked towards the classroom building across from him. He saw Fei Du, one hand in his pocket, rather calmly closing the window, gesturing towards him from a distance.
"There are hundreds of thousands of tall buildings in the world. Why did she choose this one?"
"…what kind of mother would choose that time, leaving her corpse for her child to find on purpose?"
"She hated me."
"She…"
From the next building over, Luo Wenzhou responded to the WeChat message Fei Du had sent him: "Xia Xiaonan said her mom hated her. Is that true, or did you use some kind of trick to make her misunderstand?"
"It's true." Fei Du, who had just been calm and charismatic, was so cold his fingers were fumbling. With forced poise, he managed not to shiver like a quail, leaning against the classroom's heater when he'd closed the window. "Of course, a long-term depressive mood was the main cause. Though when a person's mental condition is extremely unstable, she'll make all kinds of cries for help towards her friends and family. If she doesn't get a response, it'll be adding frost on top of snow for her—in extreme circumstances, she'll even hate those close to her."
Luo Wenzhou typed into his phone: "Last time you said you knew how your mother died. So she…"
At this point, he looked at Fei Du's figure leaning beside the window, saw the whole building silent, all the classrooms sunk into sleep in the darkness, and him standing alone in the small sliver of lamplight.
Luo Wenzhou's fingers paused, and he deleted what he'd just typed.
Just then, a phone call came from Tao Ran.
"We've rescued Xia Xiaonan," Luo Wenzhou sad. "We're bringing her back."
"Yes, I know," Tao Ran said. "I wanted to tell you that I just got an answer back from the Drum Tower tourist attraction. They investigated the patrolman you mentioned. They really do have such a person, the work ID number and the name match, but…"
Luo Wenzhou raised his head.
Tao Ran said, "That patrolman ought to be a woman."