The halcyon days passed by calmly, and it just so happened that, just as Ian recovered from his allergic reaction, Elly was also finally willing to leave her little ward.
That day, Amber was helping Elly prepare for her mental therapy when Elly suddenly tilted her face up and asked, “Are the flowers by the riverside blooming?”
Amber hesitated for a moment before quickly saying, “Yes, they are.” And after another momentary pause, Amber continued to say, “The flowers by the courtyard are blooming too. If you’re willing to do so, we can go out and look at them now.”
Elly looked at her, half-yearning and half-timid. Amber stretched out her hand towards Elly and reassuringly said, “Don’t be afraid. I’ll accompany you the whole way.”
And then she led Elly outside. When Elly saw the throngs of people outside, she hid behind Amber’s back like a frightened little bird, trying futilely to hide herself in Amber’s clothes.
When they were halfway to the courtyard, she suddenly scampered back inside.
Amber followed closely behind Elly. She was hiding behind the door, crying as she asked Amber, “Do you think badly of me?”
Amber calmly replied, “No, of course not. You’re already very brave, being willing to go out as far as you did.”
She knelt down, meeting Elly’s eyes. “If you’re willing to do so, then I can walk with you like this daily. Every day, we’ll take an additional step, and be one step closer to where the flowers are blooming. As long as you don’t give up, we’ll eventually see the beautiful scenery outside for sure.”
Elly was very scared, but she still nodded bravely.
When Elly returned to her room, Amber saw a few doctors and nurses crowding around outside her ward. After hearing that Elly was finally willing to walk outside, they had all come here to congratulate her. “It seems like you’ve really cured her now.”
Amber honestly replied, “Recovery is a long route, and this is only one step.”
She wasn’t being modest. Elly walking outside only meant that she had entered the recovery phase; her most important hurdle was still yet to come.
Beryl was also here, and as he looked at her, he gave her an unusually pertinent remark. “The efforts that you’ve spent on her probably would have been sufficient to treat ten other manic patients.”
Amber stubbornly refuted, “Can we quantify the value of patients? Dr. Alva, you have to be careful with your words.”
Beryl’s look turned supercilious with that remark. “Try that with all of your patients and see if you don’t die from overwork!”
Amber really was quite tired, partly because it was close to graduation, which meant that she had to advise her students on their theses and also help recruit students to the university on top of everything else.
Starting from this year on, the head was even going to let her take on her own medical students. There were a plethora of things to work on.
At least Ian wasn’t taking up much of her time recently. The two of them were just like parallel lines, not interacting at all beyond sleeping together at night.
***
That day, Amber was prepared to work overtime, but Trysta unexpectedly went to the hospital to get a checkup quite late in the day. Thus, they arranged to get dinner together after work.
“Call your Mr. Axton over! Ever since you got together with him, we never get to see you at our gatherings,” Trysta grumbled to Amber.
Amber thought that her words made sense. Thus, she decided that it was finally time to formally introduce Ian to her own classmates, and since it was a Friday, she said, “Then, why don’t we call Silvia and everyone else over? The more the merrier!”
After making the suggestion, Amber called Ian and asked if he was fine eating dinner with her classmates. She knew that he found running back and forth very troublesome, so she only asked him to arrive at the restaurant when dinner was served.
She didn’t expect that he would actually come over to personally pick her up. As Amber and Trysta walked out of the hospital, Amber received an unexpected and pleasantly surprising call from Ian.
Trysta even joked, “If he arrived with a bouquet of flowers, then I’d certainly feel like the Ian I’ve known till now was just an illusion.”
Because everyone was getting off work right now, there were a fair number of people outside the hospital. Without anything else to do, the two of them had a nice chat while they waited at the curb for Ian to arrive.
But before Ian arrived, Beryl and several of her colleagues also left the hospital. It was already spring, and the pleasant weather made the bachelors in her department feel lonely and impatient, and they had actually arranged a get-together with some female colleagues from another department.
When they saw Amber, they all quickly I ran over to try to convince her to tag along. “Dr. Camille, come with us, won’t you?”
Beryl just huffed at them from the side. “She’s not single! Her boyfriend’s quite amazing, don’t you know?”
While they were chatting amicably, Amber suddenly heard a crisp female voice from behind. “Trysta!”
Everyone turned around and saw Sarah standing not far from them. She was looking at Trysta with a complicated expression. “Can we talk?”
Trysta glanced at her emotionlessly, completely ignoring her.
Amber immediately felt a headache coming on, and she chased her colleagues who were sticking around to watch the show away. “Alright, alright, alright. Get going, you all. It’s a bad look if you arrive late to a gathering as gentlemen.”
She chased all the bystanders away and then pulled Trysta in an attempt to leave. “Ian should here soon. Let’s go over and wait.”
But Sarah wouldn’t give up. She cut them off, and perhaps it was because she had been pushed to the brink by Trysta’s actions, but when Trysta refused to talk privately with her, she threw caution to the wind and publicly aired her laundry.
“It was you, wasn’t it? You’re the one who did this to me, right? Trysta, why do you have to be so ruthless? Why?!”
Trysta raised her hand, lowered her head, and gently patted her stomach. This action was very provoking-at the least, it was very provoking to Sarah. She had once been pregnant, but before she could experience the joy of motherhood, Frank had forced her to get an abortion.
At that point, even after Sarah’s eyes had long since turned red, Trysta calmly smiled and innocently asked, “And just what did I do to you?” She looked at her with a false veneer of warmth. “Sarah, you snatched away my man and broke apart my family even after I treated you like my friend all this time. So tell me. Just what did I do to you?”
“You … that day, you intentionally did it, didn’t you? You intentionally led me over, got me drunk, and then you were also the one who convinced that guy to come over too, weren’t you?!
Make him leave, tell him to scram! I don’t care what you do, but I never want to see him again! As long as you do that, I promise that I’ll never see Frank again, and I’ll break off my relationship with him permanently.”