Four-Faced Buddha [To My Shore] - Chap 2

Chapter 2: What if they can’t save them?
2024-10-13 07:08 Category: Four-Faced BuddhaTurn off the lights
It was already evening, and the lights were off in the large office.

Neon lights flashed outside the window, and unrestrained light streamed into the dark room, landing on the wooden carving of the Wuxiang hand seal, casting a plump and slender shadow on the opposite wall.

In the dim light, two men, one sitting and one standing, were present.

An old, angry voice rang out from the seats: “What kind of place is this? China! This isn’t a place where you can act recklessly! Don’t bring your foreign ways here! You’re here to protect the Second Young Master, not to challenge the laws here!”

The man standing with his head bowed, feet shoulder-width apart, and hands clasped in front of him, is in the standard posture for listening to instructions.

“ทราบ.” The man’s voice was deep and powerful.

“We’ll speak Mandarin here, okay?”

“Understood, Mr. Xu.” The man’s voice was somewhat strange, like a tree branch snapped by a cold wind, crisp and stiff.

“Go out.”

The door opened and closed again, and the shadow of the Buddha’s Hand on the wall became eerily colorful with the flashing neon lights.

The sound of a match being struck broke the silence in the room, and a spark leaped out, illuminating a small, dark corner on the other side of the room.

A man’s face emerged temporarily from the darkness, his body sinking into a large executive chair, his brows furrowed as he lit a cigarette between his fingers with a match.

The match was lazily flicked out, and a wisp of white smoke rose into the dark room. The man, now back in darkness, chuckled, “Uncle Xu, next time you can just scold me directly, no need to beat around the bush like this.”

The old man on the opposite sofa quickly got up and walked over. As he passed the window, his shadow was stretched infinitely long and strangely projected onto the opposite wall.

“Xiao Xiao, don’t indulge the ignorant people below. Your father entrusted you to me, so I have to be responsible for you. We’re here to do business, and making money is the most important thing.”

A dark red dot slid into a line in the darkness, and with the sound of breathing, white smoke rose again.

“Uncle Xu is right, nothing is more important than making money. But Uncle Xu, you can teach me this kind of principle yourself, there’s no need to bypass me and teach my people, how could they possibly understand it?”

There was a moment of silence on the other end, and after a long while, a forced laugh was heard: “Yes, Xiao Xiao, it’s good that you understand.”

“My father told me that Uncle Xu’s daughter has been receiving treatment in the hospital. I’m new here, so I should visit her.” The man extinguished the red light on his hand. “My secretary will schedule a visit with you. It’s late today, so I won’t see Uncle Wu off.”

The door closed again, and the room fell completely silent. The man took out a remote control and pressed a button. The huge curtains slowly descended, gradually blocking out the outside light. The countless joys and sorrows and devout hand shadows were swallowed up little by little.

Hospitals always hold a special place in the city. This place, which contains the most joys and sorrows, clearly marks its territory with the smell of disinfectant.

After leaving Uncle Xu’s daughter’s ward, Fan Xiao lingered in the hospital for a while. His fingers caressed the Buddha statue hanging in front of his chest as he carefully observed the obvious sorrow and pain on the faces of the patients and their families.

“All beings suffer, and all phenomena are inherently without form.” The Buddha statue was heated by being rubbed, and he murmured to himself with a mocking smile.

Before the echo had faded, he saw a calm and gentle face amidst the anxious and sorrowful faces of the masses.

He looked familiar. What was his name again? He took out his phone and opened his contacts. Oh, You Shulang. What a hard name to remember.

At this moment, the man surnamed You was giving directions to a bewildered old woman. After several attempts to explain, he finally took her to the elevator and helped her press the floor button.

“The area directly opposite the elevator doors is the department you’re looking for.” His smile was faint, but it seemed very trustworthy.

“What a coincidence, Mr. You, we meet again.”

The elevator doors had just closed when You Shulang heard himself being called. He turned around to look for the person and met a pair of gentle eyes. After a moment of surprise, his smile deepened, and he said, “Mr. Fan, what a coincidence.”

Fan Xiao, who had already noticed You Shulang’s hand injury, still managed a startled look when You Shulang turned around and revealed his left arm, which was bandaged across his chest. He asked with concern, “This isn’t the injury you sustained during the last rear-end collision, is it?”

You Shulang gave a helpless smile: “No, I don’t know what’s been going on lately. The car that was just repaired got hit again while parked on the side of the road. I happened to be getting out of the car when my arm hit the dashboard, resulting in a minor injury.”

The elevator doors opened as it descended, and people poured out of the car. Fan Xiao gently put his arm around You Shulang’s shoulder and shielded him from his injured hand.

Once they reached a less crowded area, Fan Xiao asked, “So you’re here today for an inspection?”

You Shulang maintained a slight distance before saying, “Yes, I’m here for a follow-up check-up. Mr. Fan, you are…”

“I came to visit a patient. The inpatient department and outpatient department are connected, and I don’t know how I ended up here,” he joked. “No, Mr. You, could you also give me some pointers and tell me how to find my car in the parking lot?”

Being with Fan Xiao was undoubtedly comfortable. You Shulang was a proper and considerate person who always thought things through before speaking and acting. Therefore, he naturally felt relaxed when he met someone who was even more humble and measured than himself.

“Great…” Before he could finish speaking, he heard exclamations of surprise from the people around him!

Everyone looked up, and You Shulang and Fan Xiao’s gazes followed. They were shocked to see a woman holding a small, thin child in her arms, standing outside the glass enclosure on the third floor!

The hospital’s outpatient building has six floors and a high-ceilinged design. The mother and child were standing on the third floor, and somehow they had managed to climb over the half-person-high glass barrier. At that moment, the woman was holding her child in one arm and gripping the railing with the other, with only about two inches of space under her feet!

Her hands and feet were trembling noticeably, and her whole body was swaying precariously. If one of them slipped or lost their footing, the only thing that could catch them now was the cold, hard ground floor.

You Shulang frowned slightly, took out his phone, and dialed the police. He was anxious but calm, describing the situation at the hospital very accurately, and asking about the best course of action before the firefighters arrived.

While You Shulang was on the phone, Fan Xiao kept looking up at the mother and son. His eyes, as deep as a cold pool, seemed to be churning with countless emotions, complex and subtle, impossible to fathom.

He heard the woman screaming, “Why is it my son who is sick? He’s so young, why must he suffer so much?!” The woman’s roar terrified the child in her arms, and the baby’s sharp cries immediately rang out.

The woman seemed even angrier: “Everyone of you can grow up smoothly, why can’t he! Why is it that only he can’t!”

“So you all deserve to die, everyone deserves to die! My son isn’t healthy, and none of you deserve it either!”

Security guards arrived one after another behind her. One of them, a doctor in a white coat, hesitated before stepping forward and nervously reassured her, “Madam, although the child has been diagnosed, it’s not hopeless. If treatment is timely…”

“Timely treatment? How much would that cost?! I could work my whole life and it wouldn’t be enough to pay for his medical treatment! I work as a housekeeper, look at my hands, look at them!” The agitated woman suddenly opened the arm that was holding the child, and without a grip, the frail child slipped down in her arms!

Gasps and soft cries filled the air. Everyone breathed a long sigh of relief when they saw the woman finally manage to catch the sliding child.

Fan Xiao, however, seemed to have grown tired of looking at him and turned to stare at You Shulang.

The man put down the phone, took off the coat he was wearing, and then asked the people around him to take off their coats and pile them together.

“Here, this is mine.” Fan Xiao handed over a long trench coat, its subtle shimmer indicating it was quite expensive.

You Shulang didn’t say thank you, he just nodded. He put Fan Xiao’s largest size clothes at the bottom and raised his voice to say to everyone, “The firefighters just said that before they arrive, if a child falls, you can use sheets or clothes to slow down the fall; if a woman falls, we don’t recommend rescuing her unless there is a large enough support, otherwise the person below may be injured.”

The man immediately decided, “Let’s get ready to catch the child before the firefighters arrive.”

He used his uninjured hand to hand Fan Xiao a corner of the folded clothes.

Fan Xiao lowered his eyes slightly to look at him. There was no extra emotion in the man’s eyes; his calm and unwavering expression revealed his strength and certainty.

Fan Xiao nodded slightly and took the hem of the garment from You Shulang’s hand.

“There are plenty of capable people, but with your injured hand, you shouldn’t participate,” he said in a low voice.

Many people came forward to help. You Shulang stood next to Fan Xiao, close to him, and shook his head, tugging at the hem of his clothes with one hand: “It’s okay.”

This was the first time You Shulang had taken the initiative to get close to Fan Xiao. It was quite normal for two men to stand close together and have some simple physical contact, but because You Shulang intentionally or unintentionally avoided it each time, Fan Xiao found the current contact novel.

Because they had all taken off their coats, the warmth of their bodies seeped through their clothes, making You Shulang feel warm, and there was a faint fragrance lingering in his hair.

Fan Xiao is very sensitive to fragrances. He sniffed it and it smelled like wild roses.

The man raised an eyebrow, slightly surprised. You Shulang was neither old nor particularly young, dressed in a low-key and composed manner, leaning towards the style of a retired Chinese cadre, yet he liked the flamboyant and alluring scent of wild roses, which was quite unexpected.

“If we can save lives today, I would like to invite Mr. Fan to dinner tonight. Would Mr. Fan be so kind as to accept?” You Shulang’s eyes were fixed on the mother and child on the third floor, and his invitation was naturally appropriate. “Consider it a celebration, and also an apology for the accident last time.”

“What if we can’t save them?”

Fan Xiao’s voice was low, light and almost playful, sounding like an allure from the depths of darkness.

With a sudden tightening of his grip on the hem of Fan Xiao’s clothes, You Shulang slowly focused his gaze on Fan Xiao’s face.

That contradictory and incongruous feeling reappeared, but before he could think about it, the person next to him chuckled softly, a mischievous tenderness in their eyes: “I was just kidding, Mr. You definitely won’t be able to save money tonight.”