Life Plan

Chapter 32, Flowering Season

"I know, Mom is the best to me."

"Good to know. Drink the chicken soup; I simmered it for over three hours. You're an obedient child, but you're not very bright. You don't always rush to take advantage of good things. Luckily, you can tell who's good to you, and listening to your mother prevents you from going astray. Tell your mother everything, okay? After all, I've been through this before..."

A draft swept through, causing the oil on the surface of the chicken soup to change color. It was still hot, and the fishy smell rose up, like a live chicken pecking at her nostrils. The taste of noodles still lingered in her throat, and Liu swallowed hard, feeling a sour taste rise from her stomach.

She's twenty-three years old. The thought kept echoing in Liu Chichi's mind: She's twenty-three years old, she should have the right to express her likes and dislikes, she's already twenty-three.

Liu Chichi opened her mouth and said in an extremely soft voice, "Mom, I don't like to drink it."

"Chicken soup is nutritious."

"I don't like it."

"I'm only doing this for your own good. Drink it while it's hot." Liu Chunhong easily brushed aside her objection as if it were a gust of wind, quickly continuing what she hadn't finished saying, "You're just too reserved, you don't know how to speak your mind. Once you're married, you need to talk to your husband properly. Other people are different from your mother..."

Liu Chichi picked up the chicken soup bowl; the bowl was slightly warm, and the greasy smell of chicken oil wafted from her nose into her stomach. She closed her eyes, buried her head, and drank it down. When she put the bowl down, she saw her mother's satisfied smile.

She stood up and left the table. Liu Chunhong tapped the table in annoyance: "I've said so much, don't you have anything to say?"

"no."

"Honestly, I've been trying to persuade him for so long, but he's still as dense as a blockhead and doesn't like to talk. I really don't know where he learned that from..."

Liu Chunhong's last words carried a hint of resentment and unwillingness. Liu Chichi keenly sensed who her mother was referring to, but she said nothing and silently walked towards the toilet, feeling the acid in her stomach rising to her nasal cavity.

She leaned against the wall, vomiting into the toilet until she saw stars. Liu Chunhong came running at the sound, and instinctively took a step back upon seeing the mess. Liu hesitated before flushing, and through the laser beams that looked like a distorted old television screen, she saw undisguised disgust in her mother's eyes: "You're not pregnant, are you?"

"No, I caught a cold from the wind."

Liu Chunhong's face was still filled with surprise and doubt: "Do you even know what you can and can't do before you're married? You may not care about your reputation, but I do."

"I really didn't, Mom." The burning sensation of stomach acid from vomiting was unbearable, but what was even more painful at the moment was, as Liu Chunhong explained, that her entire life was under her mother's control. She never stayed out all night, and she almost never went out outside of work hours.

Liu Chichi didn't understand why her mother didn't trust her or care about her.

"I'm sleepy, goodnight, Mom."

After rinsing her mouth, Liu Chichi turned and walked out of the bathroom, returning to her unlocked room. She wasn't sleepy at all; people always say they're tired when they feel wronged.

The pale light from the keyhole shone through the living room. Liu Chunhong was clearing the table and washing dishes; the clinking of ceramics and the sound of water filled her ears. Liu Chichi felt that her mother had worked so hard, leaving early and returning late to raise her, so she should listen to her mother and protect her well.

Sometimes Liu Chichi felt wronged. The door to her room wasn't locked, and every nook and cranny had to be tidied up meticulously. This was because her mother would bring relatives and friends in to see the certificates of merit on her wall, the trophies on her table, and even the notes in her bookshelves.

She didn't want to be scrutinized so closely, but these were the parts Liu Chunhong loved to show off the most. Sometimes she felt like she wasn't an independent person, but rather her mother's most prized handmade creation.

The red and orange certificates of merit hang on the wall, while the deep red graduation certificate stands in the center of the cabinet, as if putting a period to those less red certificates.

Liu Chichi still remembers the phrase "The sea of ​​learning is boundless" that hung on the banner in her high school—from elementary school to junior high, from junior high to senior high, from college entrance exams to postgraduate entrance exams to civil service exams. She thought that exam papers were the endless threads of her life, pulling and tearing until they exhausted her.

The day she officially became a CRC, it felt as if she had just climbed up a long and treacherous cliff, and a new mountain peak had just appeared before her. Social interaction and professional skills became the new track that replaced the exam papers.

This mountain was more precipitous, and the rewards at the summit were greater and better. But after taking only two steps, she was suddenly pulled away from the climbing path, and a flower was shoved into her arms. The flower was beautiful and delicate, and she had to carefully guard it, which left her with no free hands, making it difficult to move forward.

A voice told her a shortcut: take the flowers to a man climbing the mountain and beg him to help her up. Be careful with the selection of flowers, and also pay attention to their blooming season.

She was twenty-three years old, the prime of her life.

Liu Chichi was used to burying things she couldn't understand in her heart. Compared to these perplexing life events, assisting the police with the procedures seemed simple and straightforward.

The fixed procedures and standardized treatment plans had turned her into a mindless tool, manipulated by others. However, before the formalities were completed, Jiang Xiaonv had to return to the detention center, where Yan Shaohai met with her for two hours.

Half of her sign language is self-created, which is like a kind of encrypted communication.

Yan Shaohai could only pay a deposit, sign the papers, and be released on medical parole.

Liu Chichi followed Jiang Xiaonv, and Shen Shuyi drove them home. Liu Chichi sat in the passenger seat, her head constantly facing the rearview mirror, her eyes occasionally drifting to the left, as if she wanted to say something but hesitated.

She smelled the cigarette smoke on Shen Shuyi. She knew Shen Shuyi was an extremely disciplined person who neither smoked nor drank. The smell of smoke also seeped into the leather seat cushions, wafting into Liu Chichi's nose from all sides. For Shen Shuyi, who would even open the window for ventilation while eating pancakes, this was highly unusual.

As Liu hesitated, seemingly wanting to say something but holding back, the car stopped. Shen Shuyi tilted her head and said, "You go with her first, I'll find a parking spot and come right away."

"it is good."

After getting out of the car, Liu Chichi glanced back. The intense sunset cast deep shadows on Shen Shuyi's sunken lower eyelids, making her look both weathered and fierce. Shen Shuyi didn't even give Liu Chichi a second glance, slamming on the gas and speeding off like a race car, with a self-destructive urge.

She was far removed from the Shen Shuyi who held her head high in Liu Chichi's memory. Although she still wore her hair in a big bun, her spine seemed to be drooping as if it could not bear the weight of her hair.

The brief autumn quickly turned to winter. It was still autumn when Jiang Xiaonv went in, and now she was only wearing a thin coat. A gust of wind blew by, and she subconsciously hid behind Liu Chichi. Liu Chichi's thoughts, which had been chasing after the car exhaust fumes, quickly returned to her mind; there was still a patient here.

She followed Jiang Xiaonv home. The on-site evidence collection was complete, the police tape had been removed, revealing the messy room. Jiang Xiaonv patted her arm, signaling her to stop. Liu Chichi stopped where the police tape had been.

At the end of the corridor, a sliver of orange light flickered, hiding in the shadows of a corner where the sun couldn't reach. There, a pot of blooming clivia stood, its leaves, resembling a thousand-armed Guanyin, surrounding its crimson flower crown. Clivias blooming this time of year are rare; their flowering period is long, at least a month.

Clivia is a semi-shade plant, and it dislikes strong light and high temperatures. It also needs to be protected against soft rot and anthracnose, and it needs to be repotted once a year.

Liu Chichi used to have a clivia plant at home. It was Liu Chunhong's favorite plant a long time ago. Back then, her social media profile picture and name were both clivia plants.

After her ex-husband remarried, Liu Chunhong focused all her attention on her new family's life, and trivial matters like gardening no longer caught her eye. The clivia was left in a corner of the windowsill, its thick leaves struggling to survive for more than half a year without ever blooming, and even the leaves were drooping and about to wither.

Liu Chichi was still young then and thought all flowers needed sunlight. She watered the flowers and laboriously lifted the pot onto the windowsill. But the leaves withered even faster, and grayish-black spots even started to grow from the roots.

Liu Chichi was very anxious. She watered it a lot more and even wanted to dig up its roots and replant it. But when she touched it, its rotten flower stem fell off and lay on the wet soil. It was black, soft, and withered, like a scallion that had flown out of a cooking pot, landed on the stove fire, burned, and rolled into the sink.

That day, Liu Chunhong, who was off work, saw her digging with a basin of soil. She angrily questioned her, asking if she had finished her homework and why she was always doing such unproductive things. Liu Chichi explained to her mother that it was a clivia plant and it was dying.

Liu Chunhong paused only briefly before snatching the flowerpot away, saying, "So what if it's dead? It's not like it's anything valuable. Other people's sons are preparing for competitions, and you're still playing in the mud?"

Finally, the dead clivia lay by the trash can downstairs, and the family never kept any more flowers.

Liu Chichi knew that raising a living being required affection.

The clivia in front of her is growing very well, and Jiang Xiaonv has a special affection for it.

Liu Chichi thought she would pay attention to the only blooming flower in the mess, just like she did, but she only glanced at it and then turned around and walked into the mess.

The smell of blood was faint, but the eerie dark red color was even more stimulating to the eyes, and Jiang Xiaonv did not stop for a moment.

She walked to the dark depths of the room, pulled out two red plastic balls from the cabinet, shook them open, put the garbage and leftovers into one of the bags, tied it up, and placed it by the door.

Then, carrying a basin from the iron stand, he filled it with water, soaked a dusty towel in it, and began wiping the table, bit by bit.