In the following weeks, perhaps due to busy work commitments, the professor had not contacted him. The pressure from his advisor and the stress of his thesis left him to care about the pending appointment, and he returned to the dreary life of a research worker.
The school’s newest library, the Humanities Library, had large tables, ample space, and comfortable decor and lighting, but all the seats would be taken before ten o’clock. Wen Di found a seat inside the third floor of the east wing, opened his computer, and entered the journal database to browse the latest issue of Shakespeare Quarterly. On the website, the latest research results and the most cited articles were all about race studies.
His research focus was the comparative study of Chinese and English drama cultures, which had deviated from the popular trend in recent years.
In order to learn from the academic masters’ sincere desire for knowledge, Wen Di clicked on an article titled ‘The Moors: Othello and the Racial Reconfiguration in the Renaissance,’ skimmed through it, and felt relieved.
Even if he tried to jump on the trending topic, he wouldn’t be able to write such a sophisticated article.
He exited the Shakespeare Quarterly website and began to look at a few references in the Asian Theatre Journal. Recently, he had been drafting a comparative study on the cross-cultural adaptations of Shakespeare and Tang Xianzu’s plays. After lunch, he sat on a hard bench, racking his brain, typing sporadically, and managed to write less than five hundred words in the entire afternoon. During dinner, he kept thinking about the new part he had written and, the more he thought about it, the more he felt the logic was flawed, and by the evening, he deleted all five hundred words.
Reflecting on the past few days, excluding the annotations, he averaged only about a thousand words a day, and even then, a small half had been repeatedly revised and cut. He had fallen into a negative state due to slow progress, and because of this negativity, his progress slowed even more. Coupled with his advisor’s hands-off approach, he was left to fend for himself, and Wen Di felt a deep sadness, thinking of the Ph.D. student from the Department of Chemistry who had jumped off a building a few days ago.
He took a deep breath and decided to run a few laps around the sports field, hoping that exercise might bring new life to his dying brain cells.
Walking out of the old library’s main gate, he shuddered, tightened his down jacket around him, and slowly jogged towards the sports field next to the northeast gate.
Perhaps it was the university’s strict physical fitness requirements; there were many students running at night on the field, wearing headphones and exhaling white puffs of breath, running in small groups of two or three. On the lawn in the middle of the field were couples in love. Despite the freezing weather, with ice crystals hanging on the artificial grass, they somehow still sat down.
Wen Di looked at the young faces that had just stepped into adulthood and felt a sense of envy. During his undergraduate years, although he had been in a relationship, they were always in different places so he never had the chance to sit on the field and watch the stars. Now, even though he had someone he liked, such carefree times were forever out of reach.
He stored his bag in a locker at the corner of the sports field and jogged along the inner track. He didn’t exercise often, but on the rare occasion when he did, he would sweat slightly, feeling a sense of comfort, as if his meridians were being unblocked.
The cold air, combined with the rush of blood, triggered a spark in his mind at one moment, as though he had suddenly pulled the right thread out of a tangled mess. His thoughts unraveled, like peeling off a thread of cocoon, revealing clarity. Just as he was joyfully organizing his ideas, he suddenly saw a familiar figure at the edge of the track.
It was still that striking attire—long hair draped over the shoulders, randomly dyed in one color from the rainbow, dazzling even in the night. No down jacket in sub-zero temperatures, just a coat and boots, with glittering silver rings on his fingers.
Every time Wen Di saw him, he suspected that he wanted to turn into a glowing jellyfish.
“Jiang Nanze!” With his body feeling more agile, his shout was particularly loud, “What are you doing here?”
In the dim light of the streetlamp, Wen Di saw the old classmate he called stiffen up.
Judging from this reaction, there must be something hidden.
“You’re back in the country?” Wen Di stepped forward and asked, “When did you return?”
“Just recently.” Jiang Nanze shoved his hands into his pockets. Always looking presentable seemed to be a principle of the wealthy—gritting their teeth and enduring the cold in freezing temperature while refusing to wear thermal pants. Wen Di shivered on their behalf.
“It’s not a holiday abroad now,” Wen Di said, “’It’s still a long time until Christmas.”
Jiang Nanze narrowed his eyes: “I asked for leave from my advisor.”
“Even if you returned home, what are you doing in Beijing?” Wen Di asked, “Aren’t you supposed to go back to your hometown?”
“Come to Beijing for a bit of fun, and to catch up with some classmates,” Jiang Nanze replied. “Are you the only student at T University?”
After exercising, Wen Di’s mind was racing: “Then why didn’t you tell me you were here? We just talked a couple of days ago.”
Jiang Nanze was still pondering how to dodge the question when Wen Di had already pulled out his phone and opened Weibo. Jiang Nanze had a modestly active account where he often posted science facts and updates about his Ph.D. life. Wen Di would scroll through it whenever he had time.
“Your current location is still in the U.S.,” Wen Di turned the screen toward him, the evidence glaringly obvious. “Did you burrow through the center of the Earth and teleport over here?”
To keep his location showing abroad, he’d have to always keep the VPN on. That was intentional deception.
With his lie exposed, Jiang Nanze’s face showed a hint of embarrassment, but he quickly regained his composure, staring blankly at the distant dormitory buildings.
“What happened?” Wen Di glanced at his expression and suddenly felt anxious.
Jiang Nanze replied simply, “I dropped out.”
This statement struck Wen Di like a bolt from the blue, leaving him dumbfounded. “What?”
Jiang Nanze gazed at the sky with few stars, striking a pose like a thinker, which didn’t suit him at all. “No ideas, no results, even after switching research topics, I still got nowhere,” Jiang Nanze said. “Back when I first started the PhD, I was full of enthusiasm, bouncing back quickly after every setback, always moving forward. But now…” He smiled slightly. “Back then, I thought as long as you worked hard, as long as you had perseverance, you could always achieve something. But thinking about it now, if you just keep hitting a stone aimlessly, even if you hit it for ten thousand years, do you really think you could turn it into a beautiful sculpture?”
Wen Di suddenly felt a sharp pain in his chest. The deeply buried wound cracked open, and the fear that had been hidden for many years was exposed to the world.
“I just couldn’t do it anymore,” Jiang Nanze said. “I wish I could go back to four years ago, find the version of myself trying to network with the boss, and tell him not to come here. But it’s too late, far too late. Ages 23 to 26—the prime years—completely wasted in the wrong place, using my energy in the wrong direction.”
Wen Di looked at him, his cheeks numb from the cold. “Who isn’t like that?” he sighed. “But you’re already in your fourth year of the PhD…”
The sunk cost was already too high to walk away.
“Just find a good topic to publish a few papers and graduate with those papers ba,” said Wen Di.
Jiang Nanze smiled noncommittally. “I don’t want to go back to the lab for now,” he said. “I need some time to calm down and think about whether doing research is really what I want.”
Wen Di stared at him for a long moment before squeezing out a sentence: “But it’s Princeton ah…”
How many people fight tooth and nail, pouring the efforts of three generations, just to get into that place? Could it really be abandoned so easily?
Jiang Nanze shrugged and said nothing.
Wen Di thought for a moment and decided not to push it. Who would drop out of school in their fourth year of a PhD unless they had no other way out?
“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” Wen Di asked. “I thought you were doing great.”
In their previous conversations, Jiang Nanze showed no signs of distress; joking around as usual. Wen Di had even mentioned his research topics, and Jiang Nanze had seemed as enthusiastic as he was four years ago.
“I had recovered by then,” Jiang Nanze said: “Before coming back, I was in a really bad state, but after escaping the lab and spending a quiet month recovering, I felt a little better.”
Standing outside in the cold for too long had left their feet numb. As they continued talking, they instinctively started walking along the track. Wen Di felt a thousand thoughts weighing on his chest, and after a long pause, he finally muttered, “I thought you’d be fine for sure.”
Even at T University, few students ever made it to Princeton. Jiang Nanze had graduated second in their class—driven, passionate, and intelligent, with a clear goal in mind. From freshman year, he had set his sights on a career in research; he was the kind of person Wen Di envied the most.
He thought he would be fine for sure.
“You think too highly of me,” Jiang Nanze said.
Hearing the usually self-assured person suddenly became humble, Wen Di felt a wave of sadness.
“Does your family know?” Wen Di asked, “Do they understand you?”
Wen Di had always believed he had the best parents in the world. Even so, if he told them he wanted to drop out, they wouldn’t accept it easily. After all, it was T University, let alone Princeton.
When academics falter, and the future seems bleak, life sinks to its lowest point, and mental breakdown feels imminent—parents pushing too hard could drive someone to a dark end. Wen Di had heard too many horror stories of this kind.
“No.” Jiang Nanze said.
“Really?”
“They didn’t slap me, didn’t say I was ruining my future, or that I’d disappointed them,” Jiang Nanze said. “I haven’t even seen them.”
Wen Di fell silent.
“I walked out of the lab, holding my withdrawal application, and called them to tell them I was dropping out. Then my mom told me she was getting married again and would be moving to Canada. My dad said his business wasn’t doing well recently, that the overall market was tough.”
They didn’t mention Jiang Nanze at all.
So that’s how it is, Wen Di thought.
No wonder, no wonder Thomas showed up again.
Wen Di suddenly wanted to hug him: “Where are you living now?”
“I rented a one-bedroom apartment in a community next to the school,” Jiang Nanze said. “You don’t have to worry about the financial problem. I still have a lot of living expenses left.”
Life wasn’t the issue; the real problem was mental health. Even though Jiang Nanze claimed he had recovered, the chemistry PhD student who jumped to his death had seemed perfectly fine the day before, too.
“If you want to talk to someone, feel free to call me,” Wen Di said. “I’m a student, so my schedule is flexible.”
Jiang Nanze looked at him for a moment, nudged him with his elbow, then tucked his hands back into his pockets. “I’m really fine, don’t be so tense. Just take care of yourself—aren’t you chasing someone?”
“Friends are more important than lovers,” Wen Di replied.
“That’s a nice thing to say,” Jiang Nanze said. “Alright, I’m fine being alone in peace. But if you’re really worried I can’t take care of myself, come over this weekend. I just happen to have a gift for you.”
“What kind of gift is so random?”
Jiang Nanze patted his shoulder: “It’s a secret.”
With that, his old classmate put on his headphones and resumed his night jog in the cold wind. Wen Di watched his retreating figure, feeling unsure.
However, he was an outsider after all, and couldn’t fully gauge the real impact of the situation. After much thought, he decided to visit his old classmate’s place this weekend to check on the situation.
The most promising researcher he knew had fallen, leaving Wen Di with a chilling sense of dread, like when lips were to be gone, the teeth would be cold.1唇亡齿寒 (lit. If the lips are gone, the teeth will be cold): If one of two interdependent things falls, the other is in danger On the way home, he organized the thoughts he’d just cleared up, confirming that was nothing wrong with his thinking, and exhaled a relieved breath into the cold air.
He stopped at the intersection and pulled his down jacket closer. Only a road separated the school from his apartment complex, yet somehow he always managed to catch the red light. It felt as if some deity was perpetually displeased with him. The cold wind howled, and he zipped his jacket all the way up, but the chill still crept into his neck. His ears warmed slightly beneath his hat, but his face still stung with cold—his resistance to the cold was too poor. Even with his hands stuffed in his pockets, they trembled.
And, of course, his phone rang at that exact moment.
Wen Di shuddered, sneezed, and, covering his nose, fumbled for his phone to answer it.
Which inconsiderate jerk is this?
“Good evening.” It was his ex-boyfriend’s voice.
Wen Di rolled his eyes. As expected, this rude guy didn’t even have the decency to call when there was indoor heating.
“Didn’t expect me to call?”
“I’m busy,” Wen Di grumbled, adjusting the strap of his backpack. “Hanging up.”
“I called even after you got me like that last time,” He Wenxuan said. “At least give me a chance to talk ba.”
The green light turned on, and Wen Di walked toward the apartment complex. Although Heqing Garden was old, its greenery was quite nice. In the small central park, the path was paved with cobblestones, and the evergreen trees remained lush even in winter, making it easy to hide among the shadows. He crossed his arms as he walked down the path. The laptop and books on his back felt heavy, and the chill spread through his limbs. He hoped the conversation would end as soon as possible.
Wen Di tried not to let his trembling affect the solemnity of his tone: “I’ve said it many times already. I’m not interested in getting back together. What sentence didn’t you understand? I remember that you are good at Chinese.”
He Wenxuan sighed. He was good at using guilty expressions and tones to evoke sympathy, and for a moment, Wen Di was reminded of the day he received his acceptance letter.
As expected, He Wenxuan’s voice was weak and filled with regret. “It was all my fault before,” he said. “Give me a chance to make it up to you. I’ll definitely…”
“No need,” Wen Di interrupted. “Life is not a score on the field where if you mess up in the first half and do something right in the second half, it evens out. I never believed in that kind of compensation.”
After a long silence, He Wenxuan said regretfully, “You weren’t like this before.”
Wen Di thought about the past events that could be called dog blood novels and shuddered. How was this guy still stuck in his prince-like fantasy?
“No matter what I did before, you always supported me, tolerated me…”
“That had nothing to do with you,” Wen Di said. “I did those things because I liked you. Now that the liking has run out, please don’t bring it up again.”
“I don’t believe it,” He Wenxuan said. “Our relationship that has lasted for so many years, can it be run out just because we say it’s run out.”
Can this person even understand human words? He admitted he was wrong, yet he still acted like feelings couldn’t be erased. His self-reflection was entirely insincere. “Let me just say,” Wen Di sighed, “you didn’t love me that much either, so stop acting like you’re deeply affectionate.”
He Wenxuan frowned. “How could you say that? I’ve always loved you, I just didn’t realize it before. I went crazy searching for your number, came back from thousands of miles away to see you, stood in the cold wind waiting for you—doesn’t that prove anything?”
Wen Di silently stared at him as dead leaves blew past his feet, trembling and rinsing on the old manhole cover.
When Wen Di spoke again, he was filled with barely-contained anger.
“Now, even kindergarten kids know who they like, and here you are, a grown man with a career and a family, trying to play this ‘I didn’t realize I loved you’ nonsense?” Wen Di was furious. “You insulted my character before, and now you’re insulting my intelligence!”
This guy was obviously taking advantage of the fact that he was safely on the other end of the phone line, spewing such ridiculous statements!
He Wenxuan was silent for a moment, not arguing back, and simply said, “I only know that I like you. I won’t give up on something I like.”
Wen Di grabbed a handful of his hair, feeling the heat surging up his throat. He ended the conversation with one sentence: “Crazy.”
He hung up, his hands trembling uncontrollably, not sure whether it was from the cold or the anger.
He had no idea what had gotten into this guy this year, with all the non-stop texts and calls. If this continued, he’d have to go to the police and file a harassment report.
Distracted by the call, he had walked all the way to the other side of the neighborhood. In this freezing weather, he had to turn back, cursing a few times in his heart
As he reached the downstairs, he felt a chill on his neck. Touching the cold back of his neck, it was as if a drop of water had fallen into the sea of memories. He finally remembered the professor he hadn’t heard from in ages.
He opened WeChat and started to ask: [Professor, it’s about to hit below ten degrees in Beijing. When are you going to return the scarf to me?]
The other party replied quickly: [I’m in Nevada for the next two weeks.]
Of course, he was away on an overseas exchange. Wen Di was about to reply, ‘Then let’s talk later’, when the other party sent a Taobao link. He clicked it open—it was a scarf identical to the one he had lent him.
Bian Cheng: [I’ll buy a new one.]
Oh my God, who ask for a scarf? He wasn’t so broke that he couldn’t shell out twenty bucks himself!
Wen Di: [No need, there’s a big difference in temperature between day and night over there, you should keep it to protect your own neck.]
Then Bian Cheng sent over two pictures..
Professor could also send pictures? Wen Di clicked on it and saw that it was landscape shots, seemingly taken from a helicopter. A red canyon in the photo stretched across the land, with rocky walls on both sides showed traces of crustal evolution. The blue sky, yellow earth, highway, and cliffs, the essence of the American West appeared in front of his eyes.2扑面而来: literally means come to one’s face
Wen Di sent a polite compliment: [So beautiful.]
The other side was ‘typing’ for a long time, typing and deleting, typing and deleting again, nearly driving the doctoral student, shivering in the cold, to impatience.
Wen Di was almost at the gate of Heqing Garden when the man on the other side finally said: [Just beautiful? No other thoughts?]
Complimenting its beauty wasn’t enough? Were the expectations for praising scenery pictures this high?
Wen Di was puzzled, thought for a while, and then sent: [It would be nice if I could visit there one day.]
Then the person on the other end started ‘typing’ again. By the time Wen Di got home, a message popped up, and when he saw it, he nearly dropped his phone.
Bian Cheng: [Have you been in a car accident?]
Why do you curse people when you don’t agree with them? Wen Di: [I may be poor, but I am not so miserable.]
Bian Cheng: [Do you have a split personality? Each personality can only retain its own memories?]
Wen Di’s expression became more and more distorted: [You want to change your career and write novels?]
After a while, the other party said: [Sorry, don’t mind me. The meeting’s about to start, see you later.]
The interface then stayed here.
Too bizarre, Wen Di thought. What kind of bug hit the world today? Why does everyone seem like they’ve been possessed?
T/N: There’ll be update this Saturday and then next week, I can only update twice; on the Tuesday and Friday.
Title is from As You Like It, Act 2, Scene 4. The literal translation for the title ‘我诊断你的痛处，却找到自己的伤’ would be ‘I diagnose your pain but find my own wounds’.
