011: Glasses broken, Changling's true appearance

"This is for dyeing it black, didn't you say you wanted to dye your hair? This one is good, it doesn't hurt the scalp at all. You only need to use a little bit to dye it very dark."

Granny Zhu's smile widened at a visible pace, "I'll go boil some water."

Wen Changling laughed, "I'll help you dye it."

Huahua also hopped off the bamboo bed and followed.

After dyeing her hair, Wen Changling used a watering can to collect the water and gently sprayed it over the vines of the Hooked Cymbidium. The merchant who sold Beauty Sunflowers said that natural fertilizer is the best.

She didn't know when her Hooked Cymbidium would bloom.

After the trip was over, Wen Changling's days returned to normal. She was on a five-day shift rotation as a nurse in the oncology department of Dihong Hospital, with shifts scheduled as "day on, day off, night on, day off."

Today was Monday, and Wen Changling was on the day shift. She arrived at the hospital at 7:40 AM, ready for the handover at 8 AM, and by around 9 AM, she had finished preparing the medications and started the patients' infusions.

The family of patient in bed 6 of room 4 was making a scene, their voices so loud that the whole floor could hear them.

"Why aren't you resuscitating him? Why aren't you intubating?" The family's last name was Chen, and they were very agitated, "We pay so much for the hospital stay every month, and this is how you treat patients?"

Jiahui patiently explained, "Ms. Chen, we've gone over these issues with you and your mother before, and you both signed the relevant consent forms, agreeing not to take any traumatic medical emergency measures."

The oncology department at the hospital dealt with too many incurable diseases, and when a person's life was at the crossroads between life and death, some patients would consider forgoing life-sustaining treatments that offered no quality of life and instead move to palliative care.

Before moving to palliative care, relevant documents had to be signed.

The principle of palliative care is to alleviate the patients' suffering, allowing them to live out their last days with dignity, which also means foregoing procedures like intubation and other painful resuscitative measures, including cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

The hospital would inform patients and their families of these measures in advance.

Ms. Chen seemed to have forgotten the contents of the relevant documents, "I agreed not to resuscitate, but you still charge money, don't you?" Or perhaps she was just unsatisfied with the hospital bill, "Only taking money without doing anything, there's no hospital more unscrupulous than this! I'm going to expose you online and let everyone see how you scam patients."

Jiahui, trying to contain her temper from exploding, did her best to pacify, "Ms. Chen, please calm down—"

Ms. Chen was not calm and with a flick of her arm, she pushed Jiahui.

Jiahui stumbled backward several steps, crashing into Wen Changling who was passing by with a nursing cart. Wen Changling immediately reached out to steady the cart while Jiahui's elbow accidentally hit her glasses.

As the glasses hit the floor, Jiahui, still unsteady on her feet, stepped on them, and the lenses broke.

Jiahui, leaning against the wall for support, finally steadied herself, first checked on Wen Changling, "Are you all right?" Then she looked at the ground, feeling apologetic, "I stepped on and broke your glasses."

Wen Changling bowed her head, with her fringe covering the sides of her face, "It's all right."

Just as Jiahui was about to take a closer look at Wen Changling's eyes, Wen Changling, like a magician, pulled out an identical pair of glasses from her pocket and put them on.

She adjusted the frames, "I have a spare."

It was quite... magical?

Seeing that Wen Changling was involved, Ms. Chen immediately lashed back, her voice even louder than before, "What kind of garbage hospital is this, letting a deaf person be a nurse?"

Jiahui couldn't bear personal attacks, "Ms. Chen, if you keep this up, I'm calling security. Our hospital's corridors are all monitored, and your rude behavior just now has been recorded."

Dihong was a private hospital and although service was its highest priority, both the security and legal teams were top-notch. For unruly and irrational family members like Ms. Chen, the hospital had a set of mature procedures to deal with it.

Ms. Chen looked up, searching for the cameras, and sure enough, her cursing and swearing subsided.

Wen Changling finished collecting the broken pieces of glass and went off to the ward pushing the cart filled with medications.

After Jiahui had "persuaded" Ms. Chen to leave, she noticed a piece of broken lens on the ground that had been overlooked. She picked it up, intending to throw it in the trash, and upon a casual touch, she found the lens quite thick.

But it was flat, non-prescription.

Jiahui halted, somewhat puzzled. The glasses that Wen Changling wore did not seem to be for nearsightedness, What glasses was she wearing then?

During lunch.

Jiahui and Wen Changling sat together, "Changling, aren't you nearsighted?"

"I am nearsighted," Wen Changling looked up, her thick lenses shielding her eyes, "Why?"

"Your glasses seem like they are plain glass."

Jiahui was also nearsighted, and aren't nearsighted glasses supposed to have a curve?

"That's just how they are," Wen Changling explained, "I had a friend specially make them for me."

"I see."

As Jiahui munched on a chicken leg, she thought: This friend's aesthetics are mediocre at best. Wen Changling's frame is too large, the rims are too thick, and the blue light reflecting off the lenses is very obvious. Plus, with Wen Changling's small face, the glasses look bulky and cumbersome, even covering her eyebrows, seriously downplaying her looks.

Suddenly, Jiahui leaned in closer, "Looking closely, your eyes are actually quite beautiful."

Why hadn't she noticed before? Wen Changling was quite distinctive, her features might be a bit soft, but they had a sense of story to them, fitting for film photography. Maybe it was the presence of the glasses that made people overlook her facial features.

Noticing Jiahui staring, Wen Changling immediately turned her face away.

"High nearsightedness makes your eyes seem smaller with glasses, you'd definitely be prettier without them," Jiahui said, "You could wear contact lenses."

Wen Changling, with her head down, sipped her soup with a spoon, "I'm not used to contact lenses."

All right then.

Not every girl is into beauty, at least Wen Changling isn't. Jiahui had never seen her dressed up; she was always bare-faced, always left her bangs down, always reduced her presence to the minimum.

And yet... Wen Changling's skin didn't show a single pore.

Jiahui was envious.

Jiahui ate while scrolling through her phone.

"Did Yan Cong bring you here this morning?"

"Mhm."

"His motorbike got photographed," Wen Changling wasn't that into following hospital gossip, but Jiahui provided her with live updates, "Qiao Yi is being sarcastic in the group again."

Yan Cong had spent a long time in the hospital during the year of his surgery. His family and father were very well-known, and he had also made it into the national team as a young hockey player, becoming the most eye-catching dark horse of that year. His unforgettable face had been on television and trending searches, when people expected this handsome young man to make it big in sports or switch to the entertainment industry, he suddenly vanished, without a trace ever since.

Online, there were still legends about Yan Cong, but his grandfather protected him well, not allowing the media to dig too much.

On the day Yan Cong first arrived at the hospital, it was the dean himself who organized his ward, on the top floor of the VIP building. Perhaps because his face was so strikingly good-looking, many of the hospital's doctors and nurses still remembered him.

After he was discharged, he kept in touch with Wen Changling, and only her.

This turned many people green with envy, who wished to climb the social ladder, including Qiao Yi. Qiao Yi originally was a nurse in oncology, working with Wen Changling and Jiahui, but somehow she managed to move to the VIP building frequented by the wealthy.

VIP Qiao Yi: [Isn't this Yan Cong's little brother's bike?]

VIP Qiao Yi: [What a lucky girl to have such an expensive car to give rides]

VIP Qiao Yi: [Share some tips, how did you charm such a well-behaved little brother]

With three consecutive snarky messages, she seemed desperate to ensure the whole hospital knew about Wen Changling riding on Yan Cong's motorbike that morning.