Night Wanderer

Zong Ying hadn’t even taken the medicine bag from his hand when the elevator doors opened.

She gave up on it for the moment, simply saying to Sheng Qingrang, “Follow me,” before stepping out directly.

Sheng Qingrang relaxed his clenched fist as if relieved and followed her out of the elevator, only to see Zong Ying turn into the corridor on the right.

The thick carpet muffled every step, and the warm glow of the overhead spotlights softened even the damp strands of her hair. Walking behind her, Sheng Qingrang felt a sense of déjà vu—

Dozens of days ago, in the Cathay Hotel before the bombing, he had led her through similar hallways like this. Only the lighting was different, the scent was different… There were no artillery sounds outside, and the key to the door had been replaced with a smart card embedded with a chip. The only thing that remained the same was the people.

The door opened, Zong Ying slipped inside, and inserted the keycard into the power slot—the room instantly lit up.

She held the door open, stepping aside slightly to let him in, then reached out to take the bag from his hands. Without looking up, she suggested, “You should shower first. It’s better to treat the wound afterward.”

Sheng Qingrang stood motionless for a moment, so Zong Ying lifted her gaze. “Is there a problem?”

“No.” His voice carried a barely detectable tension. After speaking, he quickly turned away and entered the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

Zong Ying walked to the sofa, set the medicine bag on the round coffee table, and rummaged through it—everything she needed was there, fairly complete.

She sat down as the sound of running water came from the bathroom. Checking the time, she idly turned on the TV.

On the 42-inch LCD screen, yesterday’s military parade was being rebroadcast. Seventy years had passed since the end of the war, yet the man in the bathroom had, just hours ago, been experiencing its very beginning.

Zong Ying’s gaze gradually darkened, and she didn’t notice how long the water had been running in the bathroom.

Sheng Qingrang stood alone in front of the sink, scrubbing his shirt. Blood had seeped into the fibers, stubbornly refusing to wash out. He suddenly stopped, gripping the edges of the sink, veins standing out on the backs of his hands. He glanced once more at his reflection in the mirror before shutting off the tap. The sound from the TV outside grew clearer—

The female commentator’s voice, accompanied by the march music, repeated the same four words over and over: “Victory in the War of Resistance.”

Sheng Qingrang pushed the door open and stepped out.

With no clean clothes to change into, he could only wear the bathrobe. Zong Ying turned to look at him, finding nothing amiss, and didn’t rise from her seat. “Sit,” she said. “I’ll treat your wound.”

Unable to refuse, Sheng Qingrang complied and sat on the sofa. Zong Ying pulled the medicine bag closer, deftly tore open an alcohol wipe, and under the overhead light, began tending to his injury.

The concentrated sting of the alcohol made Sheng Qingrang frown imperceptibly. “Any deeper and you’d have needed stitches,” Zong Ying remarked. “You’re lucky.” After opening the medicine box, she applied the ointment while Sheng Qingrang asked, “Why were you in Nanjing today, Miss Zong?”

Zong Ying didn’t evade the question. “My grandmother returned to China to look for relatives. She has family in Nanjing, so I accompanied her.” Her eyes remained fixed on his wound, her eyelids slightly lowered, but then she suddenly looked up at him. “And you? Why were you there? How did you get hurt? Where have you been all this time?”Questions tumbled out one after another, her curiosity so uncharacteristically unrestrained.

Sheng Qingrang lowered his gaze at her probing, their eyes meeting briefly in an accidental collision. He hesitated slightly; she averted her eyes, her soft fingertips pressing gently against his face to secure the dressing.

When he didn’t respond, Zong Ying hummed a questioning "Hmm?"

Sheng Qingrang collected himself and replied, "The residential area where you were today, Miss Zong, was the Sheng family’s Nanjing residence over seventy years ago. I went back tonight to retrieve some documents. As for the wound, it was an accident at the docks. These days, factories in Shanghai have begun relocating, and the procedures for safe passage are cumbersome. I’ve been shuttling between Shanghai and Zhenjiang to handle matters for them, so I haven’t returned to the apartment in a long time."

"Where have you been staying these nights?"

"Some shops or hospitals stay open all night. I can stay there until morning."

"Why haven’t you used the card?"

"Hmm?" Sheng Qingrang clearly hadn’t expected her to track every transaction in real time. He answered, "Someone bought a watch from me, so I had some cash on hand. It ran out just yesterday."

His answers were all reasonable. Zong Ying began tending to the wound on his neck. His jaw blocked part of the light, forcing her to lean in closer to see clearly. Her breath brushed faintly against the thin skin of his neck.

"Mr. Sheng?" she suddenly spoke as she applied the dressing. The muscles in his throat tensed abruptly. "What is it?" he asked.

"Are you unwilling to trouble me?"

"No, Miss Zong, it’s just—" He fumbled for an explanation, but Zong Ying suddenly released her grip. Just as he relaxed, intending to respond properly, she raised her hand again, lightly holding his chin. "Open your mouth."

An obedient patient, he complied. The sting at the corner of his lips became more pronounced.

It was a small wound left by a sharp metal fragment—hardly bleeding, barely noticeable, but Zong Ying had caught it.

Her thumb brushed lightly over the corner of his lips. "Does it hurt?"

Their eyes met, so close that for a fleeting moment, there was a hint of fluster, a subtle restraint in the exchange.

Zong Ying abruptly withdrew her hand and said nonchalantly, "This will heal quickly even without treatment. Don’t worry about it."

She stood up to wash her hands. When she emerged from the bathroom, the military parade on TV was nearing its end, but the caption in the corner—"70th Anniversary of the Victory in the War of Resistance"—remained. Sheng Qingrang stared at the corner of the screen, the tension in his profile unrelenting.

Those hellish years would eventually end, but they had been far too long. How many could endure them?

When he turned to look at Zong Ying, she bent down, picked up the remote, and turned off the TV.

"You need rest now," she said. Otherwise, how would he muster the energy to face tomorrow’s sunrise?

The room fell silent again. Zong Ying asked, "How long will you stay in Nanjing?"

He replied, "I’ll return to Shanghai the day after tomorrow."

"Then keep the key card and come back here tomorrow." She walked toward the door, pausing to add, "Good night."

Before Sheng Qingrang could return the farewell, Zong Ying had already closed the door behind her.

When Zong Ying returned, her grandmother was already asleep.

She lay down on the bed by the window. The air conditioner hummed relentlessly, the curtains drawn halfway. Whether it was moonlight or streetlight, the room was bathed in a cold, eerie glow.Tossing and turning, she spent a sleepless night.

The next day, Zong Ying and her grandmother invited their grandaunt’s family for lunch at a restaurant downtown. Once all the guests arrived, the table was filled to capacity.

The meal was lively as ever—the elderly sisters had endless old stories to reminisce about, while the children ran around the private dining room instead of eating properly. Zong Ying felt a faint headache coming on and excused herself to step outside. As she asked a server for a glass of hot water to take her medicine, her cousin followed her out.

"Still have a headache?" her cousin asked. "Did you not rest well?"

Zong Ying nodded and handed the glass back to the server in the hallway.

Her cousin continued, "The elders are planning to go for tea after lunch. Do you want to go back and rest, or join us for some shopping?"

Zong Ying thought of the bloodstained shirt hanging in the bathroom yesterday and replied, "I’ll come along."

She had nothing to hide when shopping, so she walked confidently into a menswear store and stopped in front of a row of shirts on display. One hand remained in her pocket while the other hovered midair. After a moment of consideration, she pointed at one and said, "I’ll take that one, please."

The clerk asked, "What size?"

Zong Ying thought for a moment before answering, "Height 184-185 cm, weight 72-74 kg." Her estimates were usually accurate, so there shouldn’t be much discrepancy.

At checkout, her cousin asked curiously, "Oh, buying clothes for your boyfriend?"

Zong Ying was signing the receipt when the question caught her off guard. Her pen paused briefly before she replied, "Not exactly."

Her cousin pressed, "Then what kind of friend is it?"

"A friend with deep ties." As she said this, Zong Ying recalled the question Qinghui had asked when they first met—back then, she had answered, "A passing acquaintance."

Hearing this, her cousin assumed she was buying a gift for a potential romantic interest and remarked, "Having a connection like that is rare. Maybe you two could develop it further."

Develop it? Zong Ying took the paper bag and fell silent.

After all, she and Sheng Qingrang didn’t belong to the same era. Some thoughts, once they surfaced, could spiral out of control—no one could predict the consequences. It was safest not to entertain them at all.

Reason regained the upper hand, bringing a sense of relief, yet also an inexplicable tinge of helpless disappointment.

Zong Ying spent nearly the entire afternoon shopping with her cousin before joining her grandmother for a seafood dinner in the evening. By the time they returned to the hotel, it was almost 10 p.m. Zong Ying was driving, with her grandmother in the backseat. The older woman noticed the shopping bag on the passenger seat, scrutinized the brand logo, and confirmed it was a menswear label—prompting her to wonder.

At Zong Ying’s age, her love life had always been a blank slate. Now she was suddenly buying clothes for someone else—was there something going on? Her grandmother wanted to probe but hadn’t figured out how to broach the subject, so she kept her thoughts to herself for the time being.

When the car pulled into the hotel parking lot, Zong Ying checked the time—9:50 p.m. She quickly got out, walked around to the back, and opened the door, leaning in to say, "Grandma, you go ahead and rest. I’ll stay down here for a smoke."

Her grandmother took the room key from her and only advised, "Then don’t smoke too much."

Zong Ying nodded, helped her grandmother out of the car, and escorted her to the entrance before returning to the vehicle to continue waiting.She cracked the window open and lit a cigarette. The sweet scent of tobacco spread with the smoke. Through her limited view stretched a wide road, bustling with vehicles but few pedestrians. Just as the cigarette was about to burn out, a familiar figure suddenly appeared across the street. He crossed the zebra crossing and walked toward her. Zong Ying stubbed out the cigarette, grabbed the paper bag from the passenger seat, and stepped out of the car.

Sheng Qingrang spotted her too and quickened his pace. When he reached her, he called out, "Miss Zong."

Zong Ying handed him the paper bag, only then noticing he was no longer wearing the bloodstained shirt from yesterday.

He had changed into a fresh one, but she didn’t retract the gift. "You might not need it anymore, but I bought it anyway. Keep it."

Upstairs, her grandmother pushed open the window and looked down, catching sight of Zong Ying and Sheng Qingrang. The two seemed to be talking—Sheng Qingrang took the paper bag from her, and then they entered the hotel one after the other, disappearing from view.

Zong Ying returned alone. She showered as if nothing had happened, swallowed two pills, and excused herself to bed early, claiming a headache.

Her grandmother sat on the other bed, watching her turn away to sleep, questions piling up but left unspoken.

The next morning, her grandmother rose early and slipped out before Zong Ying woke. She intended to ask the front desk for information, but as soon as she opened the door, she nearly collided with a young man stepping out of the room diagonally across.

He looked strikingly familiar—the same man she had seen in the hotel lobby the day before yesterday. But he was entirely different now, his crisp, neatly pressed shirt lending him an air of gentlemanly propriety, a rare demeanor in these times.

In his hand was the very same paper bag that had been in Zong Ying’s passenger seat yesterday.

Her grandmother was slightly taken aback and was about to strike up a conversation when Zong Ying suddenly opened the door from inside, leaning out to ask, "Grandma, are you going out?" The moment she spoke, her gaze landed on Sheng Qingrang standing across the hallway.

Her grandmother turned to her. "You two know each other, don’t you?"

Zong Ying quickly glanced at her phone screen—5:56. There wasn’t enough time left.