Chapter 982 - The Past [2 in 1] (1/2)
Holding the umbrella, Chen Ge walked into the raining city. He could not tell whether he was doing this for the mission or really wanted to help the woman. Perhaps it was a mixture of both.
He took a taxi to Jiujiang’s Children’s Home. Even though it was already way past the visiting hours, due to various reasons, Chen Ge knew the guard that was posted at the door and the teacher who looked after Fan Yu at the Children’s Home. After waiting for a few minutes outside the door, Chen Ge was led into the children’s home by that same teacher.
“Are you here to see Fan Yu? The child has gotten so much better compared to before. I do not know what happened, but he stopped closing himself up inside his own world, and he started to attempt to interact with others. The paintings that he draws are no longer that scary. Other than black and red crayons, he has started to use other colors as well.” The teacher was very happy, and she could not stop praising the improvement that Fan Yu had shown.
Chen Ge had no idea whether Fan Yu’s change had anything to do with the painter at the School of the Afterlife or not. Perhaps the knot in his heart had been undone, or perhaps the painted had gone to visit Fan Yu after he snuck out from the door. Anything was possible because the painter was an entity that Chen Ge could not understand.
“Actually, I am here for something else.” Chen Ge followed the teacher into the building. He put the umbrella away and took out the picture from his backpack. “Do you mind leading me to the headmaster at the children’s home? I have something important to ask him.”
“The headmaster has left already. You can ask me any question that you have in mind. There is nothing at this children’s home that I do not know about.”
“The thing that I wish to know is from ten years ago. At the time, this children’s home was still a private orphanage. At the time, you would’ve been at school, right?”
“Ten years ago?” The teacher thought about it before saying, “How about you go and ask the guard? He’s the employee that has been on the payroll the longest. He has been watching the gates since this place was a private orphanage.”
“Okay.” Chen Ge invited the guard into the room, and he passed the picture to the old man. “Do you have any memory of this boy?”
“He does not even have a face. How am I supposed to tell?” The guard took the picture and placed it close to his eyes, his wrinkles folding together. “Besides, who can remember things that are from ten years ago that clearly?”
“Try to think about it. At the time, the orphanage should have had a girl with very bad memory. This boy should be the girl’s best friend.”
Hearing the information provided by Chen Ge, the wrinkles on the elder’s face deepened. He thought for a long time before suddenly tapping Chen Ge on his arm. “There was such a girl! Let me take a gander at that picture again!”
The guard held the picture by both hands and studied it for a long time. “I cannot remember the boy, but I have some recollections of the girl that you mentioned. She was abandoned by her parents when she was very young. Apparently, the reason was because she had a congenital deficiency of the brain. She had a poor memory and problems doing normal chores, and her intelligence was stunted.”
“Congenital deficiency of the brain?” That was a new term for Chen Ge.
“That was what I heard. The girl was quite pretty, and she was obedient, but she kept forgetting things. Many other children were adopted, but she was the only one left at the orphanage.” Looks like the elder’s memory was being jogged. “From the age two to around ten, she had spent more than ten years at the orphanage. Perhaps she missed the crucial period to cure her disease. The girl’s illness and symptoms became graver and graver.
“Initially, she could remember the names of her friends and teachers, and with the teacher’s training, she could not only live on herself but also help around the orphanage. Even though the girl had a bad memory, but she was very hardworking. She never complained when she was bullied, so the orphanage ignored the problems and allowed her to stay to help around.
“But who knew her conditions would get worse until she could not recognize people’s faces anymore? All she could do was the basics to keep herself alive, and anything else was beyond her capability. She was already too old, and she was no help around the orphanage. In fact, she needed other people to spend time to help her. Slowly, the people’s attitudes toward her changed.
“The children at the private orphanage were all still young, so she stood out even if she did not want to. After that, I do not know what got into the boss’ mind. He knew that the girl had problems with her memory, but he assigned her to watch the gates with me. The leader said that was so that she had something to do, and she would not waste the place’s resources, but I have a feeling that the real intention of the leader was to abandon her. He probably even hoped that she would go away on her own and get lost.”
At this point, the elder sighed.
“Hope that she would go away and get lost? How could you tell that was the leader’s intention at the time?” If that was really the case, everything changed. Chen Ge felt like Fang Yu’s change started then.
“The management kept sending me away to distant locations to deliver documents. I would run all over the city, and she would be left behind alone to watch the gates. There was one time after I returned that I realized the girl wasn’t inside the booth or the house. I ran all over the orphanage and its surroundings to look for her, and I finally found her under a big tree near the mountain behind the orphanage. At the time, I was so angry. I demanded to know why she wandered away from her post. She told me that she saw a kite that flew very high in the sky.
“I was so scared for her. Thankfully, the kite ended up stuck in the tree and did not fly away.” Even after so many years, when the elder thought about it, he still sighed with lamentation. The girl had left a deep impression on him.
“Sir, when the girl was guarding the gates with you, did any boys come to accompany her or treat her very nicely?”
“No, she was always alone.”
“This is hard.” Chen Ge looked at the picture in his hands and thought back to what he was told to find any clues that he might have missed. “Sir, when you said that Fang Yu got lost the first time, she saw a kite and ran after it. But according to her personality, she was not someone who would do that, so why did she chase after the kite after she saw it? Did she like kites a lot? Could the kite have been some kind of symbol for her?”
“You’re making this to be too complicated.” The elder was about to deny him when his eyes suddenly widened. “Wait a minute! Yes! The kite! There was a boy at the orphanage who was very close to Fang Yu. The boy was such a chatterbox. I believed he suffered from some kind of illness as well. He had a tendency to repeat the same thing. It was fine the first few times, but hearing him repeat the same thing every day would drive anyone nuts.”
“So, it was the boy who found Fang Yu?”
“Yes, Fang Yu has a bad memory, and she would forget what the boy repeated the next day. Every day was like a new day for her.” With the prompt from Chen Ge, the guard finally started to remember things from back then. “The two of them should have been friends, but they had different destinies. As Fang Yu got older, her illness worsened, but the boy’s illness became better as he got older. But even after the boy became normal, he liked to stay with Fang Yu. He was three years older than Fang Yu, and whenever anyone dared to bully Fang Yu, he would be the first one to defend her.”
“But what does that have to do with a kite, and where is that boy now?” Chen Ge had a feeling that the ghost he was looking for was that boy.