Papa Yao seemed particularly pleased with the soup he had bought, urging everyone to drink it. Mama Yao, exhausted from the previous meal, had little appetite and barely touched her food. Yao Jingjing ate with her head down, taking small bites, occasionally biting her chopsticks and lost in thought, her face constantly flushed. Qingmu, on the other hand, ate and drank heartily without any restraint. He hadn't eaten anything since last night, not even a drop of water, yet he couldn't muster any interest in the pot of bone broth in front of him.
Seeing that no one was drinking soup or talking, Papa Yao felt a little awkward, so he asked Yao Jingjing about her blind date at noon.
Mama Yao winked at him, "Are you getting senile?"
Only then did Papa Yao remember that Qingmu was there. He slapped his forehead and exclaimed, "Oh dear, I misremembered! It wasn't about Jingjing, it was about that... you know..."
Yao Jingjing chuckled and said, "Dad, Mom, what are you doing? It's not like it's anything shameful." She then briefly recounted what had happened at noon, observing Qingmu's expression as she spoke.
Qingmu, however, seemed oblivious and continued eating, making Yao Jingjing uneasy, wondering what he was thinking.
In fact, Qingmu saw everything that happened at noon. He originally planned to say goodbye to Yao Jingjing and leave after dealing with those thugs, but he happened to overhear the Xiang family mother and son discussing marriage with her and threatening her with her mother's illness.
Although Mrs. Xiang was somewhat arrogant, she meant no harm, and it wasn't appropriate for Qingmu to approach her in this situation. He learned that Mama Yao needed money for treatment, and since he was carrying a cumbersome money box, he simply delivered the money directly to the hospital. At the hospital, he inquired about her condition and discovered that Mama Yao had developed a brain lesion similar to Xia Wenyuan's. However, the hospital clearly didn't recognize the rarity of this lesion, mistaking it for a complication of leukemia.
Qingmu remembered that Dr. Peter had said that only about a dozen cases of Xia Wenyuan's illness had been discovered worldwide, and all of them were prominent figures. He had always suspected that the brain lesion was related to that shadow, and now everything that was happening to Mama Yao seemed to confirm his thoughts.
The remaining questions are: Was Mama Yao just an ordinary person, and what was the invading consciousness trying to find through her? Was it the cat? And how did the cat deal with the invading consciousness?
It seems we need to figure out a way to deal with that cat and unlock the memory blockade surrounding Mama Yao.
Before Yao Jingjing could finish speaking, her Mama Yao slammed her hand on the table and roared, "How dare you threaten my daughter with my illness! What kind of person are you! Just because you have money doesn't mean you can do anything! And what kind of people does your Aunt Zhao know?!"
She suddenly remembered that Qingmu was also a wealthy man, and she couldn't dismiss him with a single blow. Seeing Qingmu eating silently with his head down, she assumed he was upset about Yao Jingjing's blind date, so she explained, "It's all my fault! I didn't know Jingjing had a boyfriend. Look at my illness, I don't know if I'll still be here tomorrow, so I was anxious. Don't take it to heart, child. My Jingjing is just being filial, she just wanted to make me happy. Now that I know, I'll never do anything like that again. Please don't blame Jingjing, blame me!"
Yao Jingjing said anxiously, "Mom, stop talking, you're making things more confusing!"
Mama Yao said, "Okay, okay, I won't say anymore, I won't say anymore."
Although Qingmu was slow-witted, he realized that Mama Yao saw him as her future son-in-law. But he was too lazy to explain. Seeing that Mama Yao was in much better spirits, he asked her about the cat she had when she was a child.
Mama Yao said the cat belonged to her grandmother and was already there when she was born. When she was little, her grandmother was the head of the household, and everyone listened to her. Her grandmother treated the cat like a treasure, even more so than her, her granddaughter, so Ms. Yao was quite jealous of the cat when she was little. However, since she grew up with the cat, she had a good relationship with it. But the cat was closest to her grandmother, and it was difficult for anyone else to even hold it.
Qingmu asked, "Is your cat special?"
Mama Yao said, "It's just white, so clean! So clean it's almost unbelievable for a cat. Back in the countryside, let alone dogs and cats, even people were always covered in dirt. But my cat was snow-white all over, never getting dirty no matter where it went. I think it didn't like being held because it thought people were dirty. My grandma was especially clean; whether she was working in the fields or tending the stove at home, she never got herself dirty. Even though she wore coarse linen clothes, everyone said she looked like she came from a wealthy family."
Qingmu said, "Your grandmother is no ordinary person."
"I think so too," said Mama Yao. "There aren't many people with the surname Cuan left in Cuanzhou anymore. My grandmother's branch is the most authentic."
Yao Jingjing said, "So my great-grandmother's surname was Cuan! That's the pride of Cuanzhou! So I also have Cuan Family blood flowing in my veins!"
Mama Yao said, "I used to have the surname Cuan too. We all took our grandmother's surname. Because this surname is too difficult to write, everyone in Cuan Family Village changed their surname to Cun long ago. Only my grandmother insisted on not changing it, and we only changed it after she passed away."
"Cun, Cuan..." Yao Jingjing muttered to herself, "The two characters sound very similar, so that's how they came about!"
Qingmu wasn't interested in the surname issue, and figured Mama Yao wouldn't know anything more, so he got up to leave after finishing his meal.
Yao Jingjing saw Qingmu off, and when they got downstairs, she asked him, "How did you end up in Cuanzhou? And how did you know my mother was hospitalized and needed money?"
Qingmu couldn't possibly say that he'd come mainly to take out a few thugs who wanted to harm her, but he wasn't good at lying, so he said, "I just came to see you."
Yao Jingjing felt that Qingmu's reason was far-fetched, but she still felt warm inside and said, "Thank you."
Qingmu said, "You're welcome."
Yao Jingjing said, "I'm afraid I can't pay you back that much money in a short time. I can only repay you slowly over the rest of my life."
"No need to pay it back, that money was originally yours." Qingmu felt that Yao Jingjing was targeted by Ma Fuqing because of him, and almost suffered because of it. If he had been a step later last night, and that driver had succeeded, no amount of money, let alone a million, could make up for the regret.
"Huh?" Yao Jingjing didn't understand why Qingmu said that. "Mine?"
Qingmu realized there was a loophole in his statement, so he said, "Um... I found the money on the street, don't worry about it."
Yao Jingjing, of course, didn't believe it. She chuckled and said, "If the owner comes looking for me and I've already spent the money, I'll have no choice but to repay him with my body and give him back the rest of my life."
Qingmu didn't understand the implication in Yao Jingjing's words and said with absolute certainty, "The owner won't come looking for it."
Yao Jingjing lowered her head and laughed, thinking to herself that he was really a blockhead.
The two chatted the whole way, but it seemed like they weren't on the same wavelength, and eventually they fell silent. It wasn't until they reached the parking lot, and Yao Jingjing saw Qingmu already had one foot in his car, that she finally mustered the courage to call out, " Qingmu!"
Qingmu, holding onto the car door, turned around. "What?"
"I... I..." Yao Jingjing lowered her head, looking at her toes, feeling her face burning hot, and couldn't say anything for a long time.
"What's wrong?" Qingmu asked.
After a long silence, Yao Jingjing asked, "Will we ever see each other again?"
"This..." Qingmu suddenly remembered something and asked, "Is there a hospital in Wuzhong that's very good at treating this disease?"
"Yes, the hematology department at Wu University Affiliated Hospital is very famous." Yao Jingjing was somewhat looking forward to Qingmu suggesting that they transfer to Wuzhong Hospital for treatment, but she also felt that such a request was too much. They had only met by chance and had already spent a million yuan; how could they have the nerve to make such a request again?
Is it Three Wu University?
"Yes."
"That makes things easier," Qingmu said. "I'll go back and see if I can arrange for you to have the surgery in Wuzhong."
"Really?" Yao Jingjing exclaimed with delight. "Then we'll see each other again soon!"
"Yes, we'll see each other again soon," Qingmu said with a smile, but the image of the white cat suddenly popped into his mind.