Chapter 6: Going Home for the Weekend

The sun barely revealed a corner from the horizon, and the air was filled with the unique freshness of early morning.

Yuan Fu tied her hair into a high ponytail, dressed in a white dress and black canvas shoes.

At that moment, she stood at the bus stop, holding the 20-inch suitcase she had hastily packed that morning.

Tomorrow was her grandmother’s eightieth birthday, conveniently falling on a weekend, so her mother urged her to come home for the occasion.

After about half an hour on the bus, she reached the high-speed rail station, then took the train for another hour.

Outside the high-speed rail exit.

“Yuan Yuan, over here!”

Following the voice, Yuan Fu saw her mother standing on the steps, waving at her. Seeing that Yuan noticed, her mother pulled her father along to hurry toward her.

“You’ve lost weight again.” Her mother took the suitcase, her affectionate gaze scanning her from head to toe. “Child, why bring so much stuff? And a suitcase at that?”

Yuan Fu replied, “...There’s not much inside; the suitcase is mostly empty.”

Her mother muttered softly, “Why not just use a backpack? It’s much lighter.”

Her father led the way, glancing back at her mother. “Nowadays girls all carry suitcases when they go out. If you just watched videos, you’d know that. You only watch dramas.”

Her father drove while her mother helped with the navigation in the passenger seat. Yuan Fu, with no conversation to join, sat in the backseat, bored, opening her phone to check for messages.

The screen opened to a news headline:

[Today at 6:42 AM, a concerned citizen discovered a body while exercising. After verification, the deceased was identified as a senior high school student from Jiang City First High School, who drowned himself in the river at 4:13 AM today. Some students say the school’s academic pressure is overwhelming.]

Perhaps because they were in the same city, this news soon reached her mother’s phone. She exclaimed, “Yuan Yuan, did you see this? Just now, there was news about a senior high school student who committed suicide by jumping into the river because of too much pressure.”

“I saw it. Jumped into the river.”

Yuan Fu had indeed seen it—they even attended the same high school—but she didn’t delve into the details.

Young people generally dislike this kind of news and tend to scroll past it, but the older generation sees such reports and starts to overthink.

Her mother looked worried. “Is your work at the hospital stressful? I heard doctors are very busy now, sometimes working 24 hours straight.”

Her father glanced at Yuan Fu through the rearview mirror and replied, “Yuan Yuan must be tired after such a long trip. Let her rest a bit. The 24-hour shifts are for emergency doctors; how busy could she be in the psychology department?”

Whether it was the same in other families, Yuan Fu’s family certainly was like this.

When they first met, they fussed over each other, trying to pack all their concern into the brief time apart; but if she stayed more than two days, complaints surfaced, as if they wanted to control even which foot she stepped out with.

She was indeed tired. She turned off her phone screen, closed her eyes briefly, and relaxed her mind.

The car crossed Jiang City Bridge and entered the residential complex.

The community was built over twenty years ago, consisting of ten buildings, each up to nineteen stories tall, with the top floors left unoccupied. Because of its proximity to Jiang City First High School, many people had applied to buy there.

Later, for unknown reasons, before completion, the developer declared bankruptcy and fled, leaving the buildings unfinished and abandoned, making headlines locally.

The buyers did not give up; they formed a neighborhood committee and hired construction teams, persistently defending their rights. After nearly a decade, the complex finally became habitable.

Yuan Fu’s parents were among those affected.

Her room had already been tidied. On the bedside table stood a black-and-white panda plush nearly half her height; the bed was neatly made with a light blue plaid quilt. Across the bed lay a sky-blue pillow featuring Doraemon, and beside it a long capybara plush, oddly endearing in its clumsiness.

Next to it was a small bookshelf. The top shelf held a series of psychology textbooks, all still new; the middle shelf contained books like "Complete Guide to Therapeutic Diets (Illustrated)," "Genius on the Left, Lunatic on the Right," and "Learn to Eat to Manage Chronic Illnesses," all showing signs of use.

Facing the bookshelf was her desk, spotless, with rows of small Pokémon figurines neatly arranged on top. At the center sat a large Pikachu.

“Yuan Yuan, dinner’s ready.” Her mother called from the living room after setting the table.

“Coming, coming!” Yuan Fu put down her stress-relief squeeze ball, gently patted each figurine’s head, then turned toward the living room.

Her father sat on the sofa, frowning slightly as he looked at his phone. Yuan Fu caught a glimpse of colorful charts and line graphs.

“We’ll eat at home for lunch. In the afternoon, we’ll head to Grandma’s. Pack the clothes you need; we’re staying there tonight,” her mother said, serving her food while voicing her worries.

Her father sat back, took a small bottle of white liquor from the storage room, poured himself a small glass, and occasionally sipped it.

Silence fell for a while, mostly filled with her mother’s chatter about everyday matters. Yuan Fu responded, while her father nodded occasionally in agreement.

“How’s your relationship with your colleagues at the hospital?” Her mother offered her a chopstickful of sweet and sour ribs. “Eat more—you’re too thin.”

Yuan Fu kept mostly to herself, with little interaction with coworkers, who mostly whispered that she got her position through connections. She dared not say this aloud and replied, “Everyone’s very friendly.”

Her mother nodded. “That’s good. You’re too cold by nature; you need to learn how to get along with people.”

Seeing her mother about to nag again, her father interjected, “Our child has her own ideas. We’re old now; let’s not worry so much.”

Her mother shot him a look and placed a piece of fish on his plate, complaining, “What kind of worry is that? The Lin family next door—her son is the same age as Yuan Yuan and they’re already preparing to get married. I haven’t even pushed her to find someone.”

By the end of the meal, Yuan Fu had eaten nearly half of the dishes. Her mother beamed, quietly crediting the improvement in her cooking skills to the videos she had watched.

Yet, deep down, she worried whether the hospital meals were so poor this child rarely had a chance to enjoy a good meal.

After dinner.

No need to pack again—just grab the suitcase and go. Yuan Fu took a quick shower, changed into her Mickey Mouse pajamas, and lay down with a relaxed expression, ready for a rare, dreamless sleep.

In this small county town, most people didn’t have the habit of afternoon naps.

At university, perhaps due to the intense pressure at a prestigious school, Yuan Fu often suffered from nightmares—exams, experiments, papers, and during graduation season, worries about seniors’ careers, entrepreneurship, and marriages.

Later, after starting work at the hospital, she rented a quieter place, but her dreams expanded in scope. Recently especially, she was even attacked by nightmares, making true rest difficult.

It wasn’t that every dream affected her, but when dreamers experienced intense emotional fluctuations, she would be pulled in—and these dreams were mostly nightmares.

As a result, Yuan Fu’s mental state had never been very good. She turned over, hugging the capybara pillow, determined to use her time at home to regain her strength.