Chapter 41: Chapter 41

Arya’s heart was like an arrow speeding its way home.

She has a lot to say to Jack.  The struggles in her heart, her uncertain future, her work, and her love life.  She wants to hear Jack’s suggestion and although his words are unpleasant, he is calm and objective.

Unfortunately, the return trip did not go smoothly.  Just as they entered the expressway, they encountered a big traffic jam due to a car accident ahead.

The car had stopped moving for half an hour.  She felt anxious and called Jack but no one answered.

Chandler comforted her and told her not to worry.  He also joked.  “It seems when we are together, it’s easy to run into a car accident.”

She really could not laugh and she remembered another person who was with her in a car accident.  She remembered that the first thing he did was rushed forward to save people and remembered the boot of his car contained a first aid bag.

Chandler went forward to get news of the accident.  After a while, he returned and said.  “The traffic police are clearing the roadblocks and we should not have to wait too long.”

Arya nodded and then made a call to Jack but still, no one answered.  Chandler switched on the radio in the car just in time to hear the News Alert was in the midst of reporting on the accident involving the rear-to-end eight-car crash on the expressway and there were also two buses involved.  There were many injured people and they were sent to three different hospitals. The number of casualties was still in the process of being counted.

One of the hospitals named was the hospital that Jack worked..

After listening to the news report, Arya was very worried.

After waiting for a long time, the road was finally passable.

Chandler drove slowly past the scene of the accident following the flow of traffic.  He remembered Arya’s blood phobia and reminded her.  “Don’t look.  There is a lot of bloodstains on the other side.”

She nodded but was not in the mood to thank him for his reminder.  Suddenly she said.  “I don’t want to go home first.  Can you drop me off at the hospital?”  She told Chandler the name of the hospital.

Chandler was blank for a moment and suddenly remembered.  “Are you going to see that doctor?  Is he your friend?”

“Right.”

“Both of you………”  Chandler was probing.  “Is he your boyfriend?  Your family doesn’t know about this, right?”

“No.  He is just a good friend.”  Arya suddenly felt guilty.  She bit her lip and thought she had no reason to feel guilty.  If it is said that in this world, who are the least likely to be a couple, then it will be she and Jack.

Chandler nodded and did not ask again.  After they had driven past the accident area, the car started to pick up speed.  From then onwards, the journey went smoothly and he sent her directly to the hospital.

The hospital emergency ward was surging with people.  It seems like there were many injured people being sent there.  Chandler wanted to park his car and accompany Arya but she refused his offer.  She thanked and told him to go back first.  Then she quietly squeezed herself into the emergency hall.

Reporters, police officers, family members, the injured and other ordinary patients all crowded into the place.  The medical staff was rushing around and everyone merged into a massive crowd.

She called Jack again and still, nobody answered.

So she sent a text message.

~ I am back and saw the news of the accident. So I straight came to the hospital. Are you busy?  Whenever you see my text, call me.  I’m in the garden waiting for you.

She went to the hospital garden and sat for a while.

The sky gradually turned dark.  She felt hungry and sprinted to the nearby bakery to buy some bread, and then went to the little store to buy mineral water.  She was afraid that Jack would miss her and hurried back.

The people in the emergency ward had lessened and Arya made another call to Jack, but no one answered.  Then she resent the text message again.  She returned to the bench in the garden and sat down to wait for patiently.

As usual, she ate white toasted bread with mineral water.  This time, no one suddenly appeared to talk to her and Jack also did not appear.  She lifted up her head to look at the moon and the stars.

This is the first time she is sitting in the garden of the hospital at night.  In the poem, it says….. ‘Lift your head to look at the moon and bow your head to think of your hometown’.  But she was afraid to think of her hometown.  Just thinking of her hometown made her worried.  Now she is back in the city, she feels very relaxed.  She is so close to her Mr. Poisonous tongue, she felt her worries had melted far away..

Wait a minute……wrong……he is not hers.

She took another bite of the bread.

She took out her cell phone and looked at it again.  The painting on the screen is still as handsome but unfortunately, there is still no text message or call from him.

Arya continued to wait patiently.

Actually, that Chandler is really a good man.  He is good, kind, warm-hearted, career-orientated and filial.  It is very pleasant to get along with him.  If it were not for his inevitable return to the hometown, would she be willing to develop this relationship further with him?

But she did not feel the stimulation in her heart like the feeling that Sophia had described.  The feeling of being like a little deer dashing around mindlessly after an encounter.  Like the kind of feeling when she first discovered that she really liked Jack, that kind of panicky feeling and it seemed that……..

“So you are finally willing to come back?”  A question disrupted Arya’s thoughts.

She turned around and saw Jack.  He had changed into casual clothes and he looked tired.  The tone of his voice asking that question was still very poor.

She twitched her mouth and ignored his bad attitude.

Jack came over and plonked down beside her.

She handed him a bottle of mineral water and he took it swifty. Then took a big sip..

“Have you eaten?  Are you hungry?”  He shook his head and then nodded again.   She actually understood what he meant and took out her bread.  “Here, this is with garlic.  It is savory.”

“It’s too dry, I don’t want to eat.”

He doesn’t want to drink and disdain the bread for being too dry.  She ignored him, put the bread away and sat there with him.

Both of them sat quietly for a while then suddenly Jack said in sombre mood.  “Arya, usually you are very talkative, so you can start talking, I want to listen.”

“Who said so?”  Arya was not happy.  “Have you forgotten?  I was once dumped because I was too boring.”

“If you not good at talking, how can you sell insurance?”

“I’m familiar with the insurance business.  Once I understand the customer’s specific circumstances and work on it, I can sell.  However, my performance is only average.”  She pondered for a while and then said.  “But my clients are the most stable, and my old clients had also introduced a lot of new clients to me because I’m serious and responsible.”

“Um……”  Jack leaned back on the bench and nodded in her achievements.

Apparently, he was very tired and she was at a loss for words.  Then she kept silent again.

Suddenly Jack said.  “Arya, I’m in a really bad mood.  Can you talk about something to lift up my spirits?”

“Under such circumstances, isn’t it right for you to eat dinner and then go home to sleep?”

“I feel very tired, I don’t want to move.”

What kind of reason is this?!  Arya frowned.

“If your mood is not good, you should take some sugar but I didn’t bring any chocolate.”

“I hate don’t like chocolates much.”  Jack’s discourteous reply showed his dislike for the taste.

She glared at him and scrunched her eyebrows, then said.  “Then I don’t know how to lighten up your mood.  You should go for dinner and return home to rest.”

Jack turned around his head to look at her and used his fingers to rub the spot between her eyebrows to ease her.  “Aren’t you the best at making me feel happy?”

Arya widened her eyes in surprise.  “When did I have this ability?”

“When I came out of the operating room, I was in a bad mood and felt very tired.  But when I looked at my phone, I saw six missed calls and two unread text messages, I suddenly felt bit better.”

Really abnormal!  She stared at him…….this man always treated her concern for him as entertainment.

“You even dare to mention this!  You promised to pick me up today, why didn’t you give me a call?”

“You already have someone to send you and also drop you off right at your doorstep.  After that, you will be holding hands and returning home with him.  And yesterday you also hung up on me!”  Mentioning this, he became angry.  “You hung up on me and didn’t even call me again.  Of course, I won’t call you first.”

Is he showing his temper?  This man is really annoying and she wanted to hit him!

“Quick get up, let’s go for dinner.”  She wanted to ignore him but she also did not want to leave him without a care.

“No appetite.”

“I’ll give you a few more calls but don’t answer.  Then you can look at the missed calls and your mood will be better, then you will have an appetite.”

Jack laughed and stretched out his long legs.  “I’ve said, you are the best at making me happy.  You can even think of such an idiotic solution to make me feel better.”

Pah!  Arya finally couldn’t help but hit him.

Jack rubbed his arm and muttered his complaint about her burst of violence and then sighed.  Then he leaned back in the bench and did not speak.

“Are you going for dinner or not?”  Arya began to lose her patience.  She felt like giving him a kick but she controlled herself and asked.  “Does your stomach hurt?”

“A little.”  He replied and nodded.

“Then let’s go find to dinner.  After eating your stomach will feel better.”

She made a move to pull him up.  Suddenly he raised both his hands and said.  “Arya, just now two lives slipped away from my hands.  I could not save them…….”  His voice was low and heavy.

Arya was caught by surprise and stared into his magnetic eyes but she could not find any mirth in there.  There was no ridicule……there was only sorrow, immense sadness and she felt saddened by his helplessness.

“Arya, I have a lot of things I wanted to tell you.  Originally I had planned to tell you when you come back but now I feel really bad.”

He lowered his head and looked at his pair of hands.  She was stunned and did not know how to comfort him.

“I thought after being a doctor for so long, I will be open-minded about these things but it is not enough for me.  When I walked out of the operating room, the despair in the eyes of those families and their loud sorrowful cries made me sad.”  He mumbled to himself and closed his eyes.  “My hands were unable to save them.”

Arya sat down closer and patted his shoulder and tried to comfort him but she was still stuck for words.  She thought for a moment and suddenly turned to her bag.

She took out a tube of hand cream and then pulled Jack’s hand over.  She stroked his hand before squeezing some cream on his hand.  Jack watched and did not resist.  She smoothed out the hand cream over his hand and massage it so that the cream slowly penetrated into his skin.

“Don’t you apply hand cream after using disinfectant?  Your hand is very dry.  You should know that a doctor’s hand is very important.  You are only a doctor.  Do you think yourself as God?  You’re still young and there are a lot of medical skills you still have to learn.  They knew you have tried your best to save them.  You were not able to save the two but didn’t you save many others?”

Jack did not speak, looked up at her face and then looked down again at her hands massaging the cream on his hand.

“How can you be so fragile as a doctor?  If you can’t withstand this little stress, how are you going to carry out more surgeries on other people later?  People like us who sell insurance, we are often rejected and have our calls cut off.  There are also people who have used vulgar words to scold me and if I am too fragile, then those calls wouldn’t have been made at all.”

“You’re not fragile.  Your nerves are as thick as an elephant’s legs.”  Jack interrupted and his voice was so soft that Arya was unable to hear clearly.

“What are you mumbling about?”  After rubbing one hand, she changed to his other hand.  “Anyway, as a doctor you should take good care of yourself.  What is the meaning of ‘no appetite’ and you don’t want to eat, then say you’re ‘not in a good mood’ and shamelessly insist on not going home?  You can’t do this kind of thing again, do you understand?  You have to take care of yourself before you can take care of the patients.  A doctor’s salary is very high, so working a bit harder is also right and having stress is normal.  You have to learn to overcome it.”

The more she talked, the more she side-tracked and she even touched on his high salary.  Jack listened to her, at times lifting his eyebrows and then wrinkling his eyebrows.

Finally, after massaging both his hands, Arya took a look at them and felt very satisfied.  “It’s done.  Look, a cheap hand cream also works very well.  Your hands are so big, it’s really a waste of the cream.  You need at least three times the amount to completely cover your hands.”  It really pains the heart to talk about it.  That branded designer cream really cost a dent in her pocket.

She tidied up her things and pulled him up.  With a bossy tone, she said.  “Come, let’s have dinner.  After dinner, go home and take a bath before you sleep.  When you wake up, once again, you will be a handsome, energetic doctor again.”

Just as she pulled him a few steps forward, she felt her wrist tighten and a counterforce pulled her back.

She looked back.  Jack pulled her back and hugged her in his arms tightly.  Before she could react, her vision darkened.  He lowered his head and kissed her on her lips.

Arya blinked and could feel his soft lips.  He did not quickly lift his lips like he did the last time but instead, he increased the pressure of his kiss, lingering on her lips.

She also did not know what she was thinking.  Subconsciously and instinctively, she lifted her arms and hooked them around his neck.  She parted her lips and kissed him back.

Jack pulled her close and angled his mouth for better access. His hands curled around her head and his other hand slowly removed her glasses. Then he again pulled her close and bit her lips.

Arya's lip parted even more and her grip on his neck tightened. In an instant he invaded her mouth with his hot tongue.!!