The Taming of the Ruffian Hero

Chapter 49 (Feeling Helpless in a Dark Alley) Painful Memories

Someone said confusedly, “Hasn’t Zhang Dong always taken care of Lin Wenxi?”

“What was going on?” Gu Yu asked Shu Xiaoman, the nearest bystander of the conflict, but she cried so hard that she could not utter a single word.

Chen Wanxin contemplatively looked at Shu Xiaoman and felt very surprised.

“Come on, they’re grown-up men. Let them handle their own business. Let’s continue to play,” Wang Zhengjuan said and immediately came up with a game, which was similar to music chairs. Instead of snatching chairs, they passed around a sheet of paper with their mouths and the one who failed to pass the paper to the next person when the music stopped would be eliminated. The boys and girls felt excited upon hearing this idea. They asked the waiters to come in and clean the table for them. After that, they gleefully began to play.

Shu Xiaoman did not seem to be interested in this game at all. She stood up and wanted to go out. Zhang An’an grabbed her hand to stop her and slowly shook her head toward her, while saying, “Tell me what happened.”

As Shu Xiaoman refused to talk to her, Zhang An’an dragged Wang Xiang aside and whispered something beside his ear while throwing a quick glance at Chen Wanxin. Evidently, she had already guessed what had happened to Shu Xiaoman.

The next moment, Zhang An’an pushed Wang Xiang away while complaining. “Sigh, how can you be so stupid?”

Wang Xiang scratched his ear and went back to drink with the boys while muttering to himself. “That’s ridiculous. You’re not making any sense.”

Chen Wanxin played a piece of dance music and proposed a toast to keep the party lively. They guys felt excited again and quickly forgot about what had just happened.

“I have to leave now. Help me find him and then contact me,” Zhang Dong said to Zhao Yuan on the phone.

“Please rest assured. He’s my roommate. I have the responsibility and obligation to take care of him.” Zhao Yuan replied. After leaving the karaoke club, he went to the top of a nearby pedestrian bridge to look around, searching for Lin Wenxi. He believed that Lin Wenxi would not want to go back to the university now.

Zhang Dong got into a military car. His driver glanced at him and asked teasingly, “Brother Dong, how did you get hurt during such a short time?Did you catch your woman cheating or something?”

“That’s none of your business. Let’s get down to some serious business and go to find Boss Mo now,” Zhang Dong replied in a deep voice while wiping the blood off his forehead with a tissue and taking some shards of glass out of his wound. After that, he acted as if nothing had happened and continued to chat with his driver cheerfully.

One hour later, after searching nearly all the places nearby, Zhao Yuan came to a fountain square near the campus. He sat beside the fountain, in a daze. After a moment, he felt somewhat surprised and wondered, “Isn’t here a dazzling musical fountain performance every night? Why is it so quiet now? And where’s the fountain?” Zhao Yuan felt that the air was humid here and thought, “Maybe the performance stopped not long ago.” Zhao Yuan heaved a long sigh and saw the steam come out of his mouth.

Suddenly, he heard someone complain, “What a pity. If that boy hadn’t stepped into the fountain and stayed there for more than half an hour, the performance would not have stopped this early.”

Someone echoed, “Yes. He must be crazy. Who would want to step into a cold fountain in the winter? He’ll suffer from frostbite if he has not frozen to death.”

Their words made Zhao Yuan’s heart ache. He thought anxiously, “What? He stepped into the cold fountain and stayed there for more than half an hour! Why did he torture himself like that? What happened to him?”

Finally, he got through to Lin Wenxi. Lin Wenxi’s voice sounded exceptionally cold.

“I’ve come back to the dorm,” he said on the phone.

“I’ll come back to find you. Just stay in the dorm and don’t go anywhere,” said Zhao Yuan. When he was about to speak again, Lin Wenxi hung up on him.

When he walked up the stairs, he saw obvious water stains all along the way. He opened the door of Dorm No. 216 and saw water stains at the door, inside the room and in front of Lin Wenxi’s desk. He found some wet clothes in the bucket and then he saw Lin Wenxi lying on his bed, shivering. He wrapped himself in a thick blue quilt and buried his wet head in the quilt too. Zhao Yuan noticed that the air was humid inside the dorm and went to open the door of the bathroom. He discovered that the floor of the room was wet. He touched the shower-head and found out that it was freezing cold. “This stupid boy!” He could not help but sigh inside his heart.

Zhao Yuan was a little upset. He slowly sat down beside Lin Wenxi, and then he stood up again and went downstairs to buy some ginger powder. He made some warm ginger tea with the powder, calmed himself down and then gently patted Lin Wenxi.

“Wenxi, get up and drink some ginger tea. Otherwise you’ll catch a cold.”

Lin Wenxi revealed his face. His lips had turned purple because of the cold. He moved his shivering lips and said slowly, “You didn’t prepare the cinnamon juice just for me. I remember that at that time, Chen Wanxin caught a cold too.” He paused and then muttered. “I smelt the fried fish inside her tent that evening, but I kept telling myself that I would find another extinguished campfire you left and I would find some fried fish there. If you just wanted to leave the fish to her, why did you use the eyes that I drew to mark the spot?”

“What’re you talking about, Wenxi? Stop talking nonsense.” Zhao Yuan felt confused and urged Lin Wenxi to take some ginger tea now.

Lin Wenxi lifted up his hand to knock over the cup and splashed the ginger tea on his desk. After that, he sat up and took out a square box from his backpack. It contained a pair of paper eyes that he drew. The eyes looked ferocious and welled up with blood drops. Upon seeing them, Lin Wenxi felt that his eyes were sour. He somehow felt that these eyes were really crying tears of blood. He felt upset and tore them into pieces.

Zhao Yuan quietly wiped the ginger tea off the desk. Not long after that, Zheng Kai and Wang Xiang walked into the dorm, looking tipsy. Gu Xi also came to this dorm. He hurriedly went to hold Lin Wenxi to comfort him.

Zheng Kai looked at the cup on the ground and the water on the desk and said loudly, “Wenxi, just tell us what happened. We’ll help you out if you have trouble. Don’t just keep it to yourself and make all of us feel confused.”

“Alas, don’t you know that guys also have a few uncomfortable days every month? Brother Kai, let give him some time to calm down,” Wang Xiang said smilingly.

“Fuck! He slammed a beer bottle on someone’s head. And that someone is our military instructor! Are you saying that he did this just because he suddenly felt uncomfortable? Wenxi, just tell us. You’ll feel better by telling us the truth,” said Zheng Kai. He was obviously drunk tonight. He had never talked so much before.

“Zheng Kai! Just give him some time!” Zhao Yuan said in a deep voice.

“What the fuck! Aren’t we brothers? Brothers hide nothing from one another. If he has some trouble, he should, should tell us. We’re brothers and we should, should help one another... But he just has a tantrum and remains silent. What the fuck is he doing?” Zheng Kai staggered and then slumped on Wang Xiang’s bed. He drank too much tonight, as he always lost in the games and got punished to drink. Apart from that, he was often tricked by his cunning friends into drinking. He was too drunk that he sat on Wang Xiang’s belly without knowing it at all. Wang Xiang groaned plaintively, giving Zheng Kai goosebumps. He immediately pressed a pillow into Wang Xiang’s face to stop him from making any sound. Wang Xiang struggled, trying to get rid of Zheng Kai.

“Come on, brother Kai. Do you really think that brothers should hide nothing from one another? If one of your brothers asks you to tell him everything about yourself since your childhood, will you tell him?” Gu Xi twitched his mouth and said.

“Huh, you brat. I can tell my brother everything. If you want to know, I’ll tell them to you tonight. Come here, let’s talk for a whole night!” Zheng Kai pointed at Gu Xi and said.

Gu Xi’s heart skipped a beat, and he could not wait to throw himself into Zheng Kai’s arms and talk with him for the whole while sleeping together with him. He did not care about whether it was because Zheng Kai was drunk tonight. The next moment, he looked at Lin Wenxi and felt worried and hesitant.

Lin Wenxi had soaked himself in the cold water at the fountain and walked back to the dorm in the cold wind. He had even taken a cold shower before going to bed. When his cold body gradually became warm under the quilt, he felt dizzy and sleepy. As such, he fell asleep fast.

He had a dream. In a cold and windy night, someone blindfolded him and dragged him into total darkness. He was desperate and panicked and did not know what was going on or what that person was going to do. He was afraid that he would not be able to see the sunrise tomorrow.

He kept struggling until he could not move anymore. That person held him tightly. He felt that beads of cold sweat quickly formed on his head, forehead, and all over his body.

He felt helpless and hurt and kept groaning, but no one heard him. At that moment, he thought that no one really cared about him.

When that person finally stopped, he tightly held him and kept apologizing to him.

That person left quietly, leaving him alone in the quiet alley.

Before leaving the place, that person put all the clothes back on him.

When he removed the black cloth around his eyes, he still could not see anything. He desperately ran to the main street and saw many people there. They all looked decent and walked fast. He shivered in the wind, but no one noticed him. No one cared about him. He felt as if he was a piece of garbage, which was going to be buried forever.

When he went home, he washed himself many times but still felt that there was a sticky substance between his legs. This feeling haunted him and made him want to kill himself.

He said to himself, “If I meet this person again, I’ll kill him at any cost. I won’t mind perishing together with him!”

He kept this secret to himself and never dared to get close to any stranger again. Sometimes, when he wanted to end his life and gave up this dirty body, he would think of his parents. “No, I can’t die now. I’d better do what my parents want in this life, and when they die, I’ll kill myself. No, that’s not enough. I have to know who is that person before I die.”

Over these years, he had this dream many times. In fact, it was not a dream but something that had really happened to him. It was like a scar in his heart. When he woke up, he found himself soaked with sweat. His face was cold, and his bitter tears were in the corners of his mouth. Under the moonlight, he saw a person sitting quietly beside him. He sat with his elbow on his knee and his chin in his hand. This person was just dozing beside him, but Lin Wenxi was somehow frightened and cried out. “Piss off! Don’t come close to me!”

The next moment, he heard that person say, “Do you wake up? It’s alright. It’s me. Don’t be afraid.” “It’s Zhao Yuan,” Lin Wenxi thought and fell asleep again. Zhao Yuan gently patted Lin Wenxi and then fell asleep beside him.