RDCAB 25

Rebirth on the Doors to the Civil Affairs Bureau

Chapter 25 First Quarrel

***

It was rare for Xia Feng to leave work on time like today.

Instead of cooking at home, they drove to a well-known restaurant nearby for dinner. The place was crowded and it took them a while to find a parking space, eventually finding a vacancy some distance from the hotel.

They enjoyed their dinner and afterwards, walked a while to get back to the car.

Yu Dong liked this very much. Although it was a little ways off from the main road, she had Xia Feng beside her.

"Why don't you wear gloves?" Xia Feng held unto Yu Dong's hand and noticing that it was a little cold, told her: "put your hands in your pockets quickly."

Seeing that he was going to let go of her hand, Yu Dong hurriedly held his hand and said, "I'm not cold!"

"How can you not be cold, your hands are red." Xia Feng raised Yu Dong's hand and saw that her palm was turning blue.

After a glance, Yu Dong lowered her head and kicked the road.

"What's the matter?" Xia Feng saw that Yu Dong's mood abruptly changed.

"I wanted to hold hands with you." Yu Dong said it so softly that the words could've been blown away by the wind.

Fortunately, they were quite close to each other so Xia Feng heard what she said.

Xia Feng's eyes looked down from the top of Yu Dong's head to their intertwined hands. After a blink, Yu Dong's hand was put into the pocket of his jacket.

Yu Dong was stunned by Xia Feng's actions. When she felt her hand being put into a warm pocket, she raised her head confused and saw Xia Feng smiling down at her.

"So it doesn't get cold."

Yu Dong smiled back.

"Come on, it started snowing." After this, he urged Yu Dong to get a move on.

As they walked along the side-walk, palm to palm, accompanied by snow drifting down, Yu Dong suddenly felt like she was in a Korean drama.

"Be careful!" Xia Feng quickly caught Yu Dong as she slipped on a patch of ice. Laughing he said: "Why don't you look at where you're going."

"Aren't you the one leading me?" Yu Dong refuted.

Xia Feng blinked, then suddenly felt a little happy. He put Yu Dong's hand back into his pocket and dotingly said: "That's right, I was wrong."

Yu Dong suddenly felt that she was being somewhat unreasonable and tried to change the topic: "I heard that you met Xiaoyue and Xinxin in your hospital a few days ago."

"Did they tell you?" Xia Feng didn't specifically tell Yu Dong about this event, but he wasn't surprised that she knew about it nevertheless.

"Xinxin said you helped her go through the back door."

"It wasn't the back door, I just delayed a colleague's lunch break for a while. Afterwards I treated them to coffee." Xia Feng explained.

"Then that cup of coffee was worth it."

"Why'd you say that?" Xia Feng asked curiously.

"Xiaoyue and Xinxin are my best friends. After they heard about us they've always asked me to see you." Yu Dong glanced and Xia Feng and smiled, "Afraid?"

"That's why I went out to try and make a good impression that day, ah" Xia Feng winked.

"Oh....turns out you did it on purpose." Yu Dong deliberately exaggerated.

Xia Feng laughed.

"But you were very successful in your scheme." Yu Dong commented. "At least 50%"

"50%?" Xia Feng was puzzled.

"Xinxin. you helped her through the back door, so she's been taken care of.

"But not Xiaoyue? I haven't passed yet?" Xia Feng raised and eyebrow. "I remember when she got appendicitis last time I specially helped her. I even helped her ask the doctor about scarring."

"That's...."

Yu Dong wanted to talk but Xia Feng interrupted her, suddenly looking nervous: "Is that a person over there?"

Looking towards the front Yu Dong saw a black shadow lying on the snow-covered ground.

They quickly ran towards the figure 10 meters away. When Yu Dong saw that it was an old man who had fallen, almost automatically, she took out her phone, took a few photos and then started to video record.

Xia Feng had already run to the old man's side while she was doing this. He checked the old man's physical condition then turned back to yell to Yu Dong: "Go to the car and drive it over."

Xia Feng saw that the old man had fainted and anxiously looked back towards Yu Dong who was unexpectedly still on her phone doing something. So with a wrinkled brow he repeated: "Yu Dong, go to the car and drive it over."

"Oh!" Yu Dong finally reacted and ran to get their car. The 2 eventually drove the old man to the hospital.

Fortunately, the old man had a phone so they took it and managed to contact his family. After Xia Feng ended the call, they finally left the hospital to drive home.

Xia Feng didn't say a word the whole time, and he went to his room as soon as he got home.

Yu Dong was sensitive enough to perceive that Xia Feng was angry, but she didn't know what was going on.

Yu Dong hesitated, but eventually knocked on Xia Feng's door.

"What's wrong?" Xia Feng asked.

"Are.....are you angry?" Yu Dong asked. "What's going on?"

Xia Feng looked at Yu Dong with doubt, but she didn't look embarrassed or guilty, maybe she really doesn't know.

Xia Feng sighed in his heart and led her back to the living room.

"Back out there, what were you doing when I asked you to get the car?" Xia Feng asked.

Yu Dong recalled and replied: "I was taking a video."

"The old gentleman had a sudden cerebral hemorrhage, and it was likely that he would've died if he was sent to the hospital even a minute later." Xia Feng said.

"It was very scary, but we managed to get him to the hospital in time." Yu Dong still didn't understand.

"Then if we didn't rescue in time, if we were even just a minute late..." Xia Feng looked at Yu Dong pointedly.

If Yu Dong still didn't know why Xia Feng was angry after this, he will seriously start to doubt her IQ.

"Why did you take photos and record with your phone?" Xia Feng was puzzled.

"I..." Yu Dong didn't know how to explain. Taking photos or videos as evidence when meeting elderly who had fallen down was a measure of self-protection?

It was 2007, the countless cases of helping the elderly, only to be deceived and blackmail haven't widely spread yet.

"You should think about it..." Seeing that Yu Dong's face still had no traces of remorse, Xia Feng was somewhat disappointed and returned to his room.

Yu Dong sat alone in the living room until she had to go to work at 11:00 p.m.

Xia Feng stood out on the balcony lost in thought as he watched Yu Dong's car drive off.



"Hello everybody, this is FM9666, you're now listening to Phantom of Midnight, this is DJ Fish Jelly."

Yu Dong hosted the program as usual, but regular listeners clearly felt the host's emotional instability tonight so people began to send text messages asking about her.

[ What happened to Fish Jelly today? Her mood is rock bottom! ]

[ Is Fish Jelly's body uncomfortable? ]

[ Did something happen to the host? ]

[ Did someone in the audience send another letter with money in it causing the host to be scolded? ]

……



Fish Jelly read the messages scrolling at the computer and her low mood somewhat recovered a little.

After thinking about it she opened the microphone, organized her thoughts and said: "A lot of people just now asked 'what happened to Fish Jelly today?' Well, you've found out, I'm actually not in a good mood tonight."

A pile of text messages appeared on the computer, asking what happened.

"I don't know if our listener friends have ever heard the saying 'touching porcelain' ?" Yu Dong said, "It is said that 'touching porcelain' was first 'invented' by the descendants of the Eight Banner brothers who were in the decline during the Qing Dynasty. These people would take out 'expensive' fake porcelain pieces out into the streets and seeing an opportunity, would deliberately cross paths with moving carriages and let them accidental 'bump into him', sending their porcelain crashing into the street. He would then shout 'righteous words' and force the entangled owners to pay compensation according to the price of these supposed precious items."

Yu Dong thought of a moment, then continued: "Fish Jelly encountered an event in her previous neighborhood. There was a kind-hearted man who saw that an old man had fallen at a busy bus stop. The young man kindly helped the old man to a nearby hospital. He was doing a very good thing, but the next day the old man's family accused the young man of hitting the elderly and wanted him to compensate 80, 000 yuan for the medical expenses and recovery."

[ Sweat...how could that happen? ]

[ That's too much, call the police! ]

……



Text messages like these started popping out in the computer screen. Yu Dong continued: "Since then, people who meet elderly in distress don't dare help in fear of getting taken advantage of, or  alternatively, are afraid of touching porcelain."

"Later, someone came up with the idea of getting favorable evidence before helping, so that they could help others and at the same time prevent themselves from being cheated."

[ Good idea. Otherwise seeing someone fall and not helping isn't very good. ]

[ This method is good! ]

"So I developed that kind of habit." When Yu Dong said this, she remembered Xia Feng's disappointed eyes directed at her. Her heart felt sad and wronged. "Today I went out to eat dinner with someone I like and encountered an old man who had fallen on the side-walk."

[ What a coincidence? ]

[ Host, did you help? ]

"My companion almost immediately ran over to help the old man, and I recorded a minute's worth of video with my phone." Yu Dong continued, "When we brought the old man to the hospital, the doctor said that it was a cerebral hemorrhage, and that had it been a minute later, he might've died."

[ So close! ]

[ Dangerous! ]

[I know why the host is in a bad mood. ]

"Later he was disappointed in me and asked why I was recording a video in such an urgent situation." Yu Dong finally finished her story.

[ It's hard to say who's in the wrong ]

[ The host likes someone? What can we do? There's a misunderstanding? ]

[ The old man's fine. ]

[ If I were the host's boyfriend, I would be disappointed too, after all, a life was at stake. ]

There was a lot of discussion on the computer, many people were expressing their opinions.



When Shao Yifan called, Xia Feng who was still somewhat disappointed at Yu Dong, was in bed reading a book.

"-Ah?"

"Did you have a fight with Yu Dong?" Shao Yifan asked straightforwardly.

"No." Xia Feng denied.

"Don't lie, I just heard Yu Dong on the radio, she said when you went out to eat you ended up saving an old man."

Xia Feng suddenly frowned. Why's this kind of thing appearing in Yu Dong's show?

"Did you not listen to Yu Dong's program?" Shao Yifan asked.

Xia Feng didn't reply.

"So you didn't listen to the other party's explanation either." Well aware of his friend's temper, Shao Yifan acted as a narrator and repeated Yu Dong's story to Xia Feng.

"I was listening to Yu Dong's voice, I felt that she sounded very lost and might've even cried." Shao Yifan exaggerated.

"Cried?" Xia Feng's expression changed as he listened.

"Yes, how old do you think Yu Dong is, she's 22 years old and just graduated university. Can't you talk to people properly and listen to their explanations. Look at what you've done didn't you just question the character of someone?" Shao Yifan continued, "Do you think everyone is a doctor like us, knowing the difference between a fake fainting spell and a cerebral hemorrhage?"

But Xia Feng had stopped listening, his brain was full Yu Dong by herself, secretly crying.

Holding onto his phone, Xia Feng suddenly felt a little distressed.

He looked at the time: 1:30 a.m.

Xia Feng got out of bed, dressed and drove straight to the radio station.

So when Yu Dong walked out of the building with her head down, she heard the gentle voice of Xia Feng.

"Didn't I tell you to watch where you're going. What if you fell down again without me?"

Yu Dong looked up incredulously.

Xia Feng gently took Yu Dong's cold hand.

"Let's go home!"


***


They're both right? She has a 2017 mindset while he has a 2007 mindset.

And on a different note, I didn't think I needed to activate email subscriptions! Sorry about that, but it's up and running now.



Previous | TOC | Next